每日大赛网站 President Tom Courtway kicked off the first 鈥淐ampus Talk鈥� of the new year聽 by outlining challenges for the university and informing聽 the campus community of his expectations.
Courtway noted the appointment of 每日大赛网站 alums Elizabeth Farris and Brad Lacy to the 每日大赛网站 Board of Trustees. Farris, the daughter of the late 每日大赛网站 President Jeff Farris, and Lacy, the CEO of Conway Area Chamber of Commerce, were appointed by Gov. Mike Beebe on Jan. 13.
鈥淚 can assure you that both of these individuals that the governor has appointed care deeply about 每日大赛网站 and will do a magnificent job on our board,鈥� he said.
Before taking questions from the floor, Courtway made the following remarks to students, faculty and staff:
Where have we been? We have been in a place where we had to borrow money to make our payroll. We have been in a place where we had to have a line of credit. We have been in a place where we had to get an advance or an allowance from our parent.
We have been in a place where many of you, and sometimes me, and sometimes all of us didn鈥檛 know what was going on. We have been in a place where we have been on an enrollment and sometimes an emotional rollercoaster ride. And we have been in a place where we had no clear direction as an institution. I don鈥檛 want to go back to that place again.
So, what are some of our challenges as we go forward?
We have to develop a clear, understandable enrollment strategy for this institution, and that鈥檚 going to start next week. We can grow our enrollment at a pace and at a level that will ensure we are the best university in the state; not necessarily in numbers, but in quality of instruction and most importantly in retention and graduation of our students.
We need to provide a comprehensive monitoring report to聽the Higher Learning Commission with the help of Dean Hattlestad, Dean Lee, Dr. Glenn, Dr. Wilson, Dr. Teague, Dianna Winters and聽others on that committee, and then regain our accreditation through 2020. That鈥檚 a challenge. We can do it.
We need to develop a prudent budget for the next fiscal year and continue to be careful with how we spend our money. We must manage our finances carefully, build our reserves, and secure the financial future for this university.
Never again do I want to have to go with a tin cup and borrow money or get an advance or grovel on behalf of this university. It鈥檚 not going to happen. We need to continue to work with the strategic budget committee and we need to adhere to the overall goals of the strategic plan. We need to constantly review and constantly adhere to those principles.
So how do we meet those challenges? And there are many more, those are just a few.
First, we need to communicate better. That starts with me. Not only from the Office of the President, but all offices up, down, and across the Univeristy.
Number two, we need to share the credit. It doesn’t matter who gets the credit. If it鈥檚 a good idea, 每日大赛网站 is going to win. If it鈥檚 a crummy idea, we know what the results are going to be or if it鈥檚 a crummy proposal, we know where that鈥檚 going to end up.
Number three, we need to recruit aggressively. We need to get the best students we can get from this state, and this region of the country and all over the globe.
Number four, we need to advise and teach effectively. We are already doing that.聽 What does that mean? That means when students graduate from this place, they would have engaged in critical thinking, they will be armed with skills for whatever they may do in this life. They鈥檙e armed with the knowledge to gain employment, to improve our society, and work in a global economy.
I teach one course in the summer. I tell my students 鈥淚 want to make you dangerous. I want you to be a dangerous person when you get out of this joint.鈥� They look at me and ask: 鈥淲hy?鈥� Because I want you to be able to know enough to ask questions, and if something鈥檚 not right, you try to fix it. That鈥檚 what I mean by dangerous. So I want them to be dangerous in a good sense, when they leave our faculty. We teach effectively, we advise effectively, we鈥檝e got to keep it up.
Number five, we鈥檝e got to manage our finances efficiently. We are doing that, and we are聽going to continue to do that.
Number six, we must conduct ourselves ethically, and we will.
Number seven, there will be honest disagreements over procedures and policies of this university, and that鈥檚 helpful. No problem at all. We are not here to squelch speech and we are certainly not here to squelch ideas or thoughts. But, let鈥檚 resolve to ourselves, and more importantly, to our students and our alums, that whatever our differences, we exist to serve our students. Let鈥檚 keep our differences civil. Let鈥檚 discuss them. Let鈥檚 resolve them. And always remember, that each day we come to work, wherever we are and whatever we do, we are the face of 每日大赛网站.
We are the face of 每日大赛网站 when you face that couple with their child or their loved one from Texarkana or West Memphis or wherever they may be. We are the face of 每日大赛网站 when you post something on Facebook. We are the face of 每日大赛网站 when we tweet, whatever that is. But every single thing we do, it鈥檚 not just me, we are all, each of us, individually, the face of this university.
Finally, to paraphrase David McCullough, who is my favorite historian, in his biography about Harry Truman he came up with six things about Truman鈥檚 life. The bottom line is this, each day: work hard, do your best, tell the truth, don鈥檛 pretend to be somebody you鈥檙e not, believe in something or someone other than yourself and have no fear.
So as we go forward, through this semester and this calendar year, let鈥檚 try to adhere to those principles. And I submit to you, that everything else is going to take care of itself. This is a great place, each of you know that, we all know that. The students who come here know that, their families know that. In all the trouble, in all the trials, all the tribulations that we鈥檝e had all over the last few years, when you talk to people whose loved ones actually go here, or the students who are actually here on our campus, they don鈥檛 care. So, as long as we don鈥檛 lose sight of why we are here, and as long as we try to stick to these principles in whatever manner you want to try to stick to them, the University of Central Arkansas is going to be fine.