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| navigate: home: magazine: spring/summer 1998: article | |
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‘The Engaged University’ Higher education official proposes model for 21st century By Deborah A. Benedetti | |||||||||
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For two days, Penn State academic leaders, faculty and staff talked about outreach and the future of land-grant universities in the 21st century. President Graham Spanier called this conversation about outreach “unprecedented in our University. It is my hope that it will energize every part of Penn State to be all that we can be for the future.” (Please see the President’s remarks beginning below.) Dr. C. Peter Magrath, president of the National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges (NASULGC), was the catalyst for Penn State’s intensive exploration of outreach. Head of the nation’s oldest higher education association, he made presentations and participated in discussions with more than 500 members of the University community. During the Outreach Senior Leadership Retreat and the Academic Leadership Forum, he spoke on “Creating the Engaged University: The Importance of Outreach and Service to Society.” The retreat brought together the senior leadership of all outreach units, including the College of Agricultural Sciences, Cooperative Extension, Continuing Education, Distance Education, Public Broadcasting, Research and Technology Transfer Organization, Coordinating Council for Outreach and Cooperative Extension which represents all colleges, and the Office of Outreach and Cooperative Extension. The Academic Forum was a gathering for deans, associate deans and department heads. At the Penn State Forum, sponsored by the Penn State Faculty Staff Club and Penn State Bookstore, Magrath talked about “The Kellogg Commission: Charting the Future of the Land-Grant University” before an audience that included faculty, staff and the general public. In all his presentations, Magrath stressed the need for change in American higher education. “Why should our colleges and universities change? . . . Because the world has changed.” “We are a nation of great accomplishments and future potential, but we are also riven with huge problems in our communities: alcohol and drug abuse, crime, inadequate schooling, families (or perhaps more appropriately, nonfamilies) and the reality and growing threat of a lost, wasted generation of youth, which in turn has massive implications for the economic competitiveness of the United States.” At the same time, federal and state governments are cutting spending, Magrath said. “. . . If our federal budget is balanced by 2002, as our politicians have now enshrined in federal legislation, we face the prospect of a 20-percent decrease in federal support for research,” he noted. “State investments in higher education have declined dramatically in the past 20 years. . . . Universities in the years ahead are going to continue to have to scramble for resources and support in many imaginative ways.” His prescription for meeting these challenges is the concept of “the engaged university.” “This is a university, whether public or private, collaborating with communities, not only in their important traditional missions of educating students on campuses and producing life-saving research, but a university focused on community partnerships and collaborations. The exciting truth is that these kinds of practical educational outreach programs can be done. These are not just theory; these are models that are being put in place—including here at Penn State.” These kinds of partnerships between state and land-grant universities, regional universities and businesses and industries are “a smart way to capitalize on the resources of partners in order to maximize the support of business and governments for the resource needs of all universities, which have to be justified in terms of how they serve society,” he said. He noted that the Kellogg Commission on the Future of State and Land-Grant Universities is studying the engaged university and will issue a report in 1998. Two of six NASULGC commissions also are focusing on the topic—Information Technologies, chaired by President Spanier, and Outreach and Technology Transfer. A number of groups are offering advice to the Kellogg Commission, including NASULGC’s Extension Committee on Organization and Policy, which states:
Magrath added that a NASULGC subcommittee of the Council on Academic Affairs, comprised of provosts and academic vice presidents of state and land-grant universities, advises the Kellogg Commission that “adaptation is one of the defining characteristics of land-grant and public universities.” This group believes the old model of extension and outreach should not be discarded, but reinvigorated with new forms of engagement. “Why bother? . . . Why should engagement become a mainstream priority for great public, land-grant research-intensive universities such as Penn State?” Magrath asked. Because “it is our historic, continuing mission. It is the right thing to do and also the smart thing to do.” During the Outreach Senior Leadership Retreat, Penn State outreach leaders discussed Magrath’s engaged university concept and also identified critical issues affecting Penn State’s outreach agenda. The outreach leaders held spirited discussions on topics including faculty rewards and incentives, promotion and tenure issues, financial concerns, workload, technology infrastructure and networking capabilities across units and locations, rapid deployment of resources, differing missions within the University, needs assessments, partnerships, creation of databases to share information across units, adding an outreach component to the annual faculty review, and the public relations benefits resulting from outreach participants talking about their experiences with neighbors, friends and legislators. | ||||||||
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President Graham Spanier spoke to more than 70 University leaders responsible for outreach during the Outreach Senior Leadership Retreat held in February at The Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel. I’m glad to have this opportunity to be with you today, yet I can’t help but note that “outreach retreat” is a bit of an oxymoron. It is important to stop every now and then to refocus and recharge in order to keep moving ahead. This is a perfect time for the outreach leadership at Penn State to do so. We have spent the last year or two reorganizing to promote the integration of teaching, research and service within our academic community, and to marshal more collaboratively and rapidly the entire range of resources at this University in support of the citizens and communities of our state. The uniting of Continuing and Distance Education and Cooperative Extension is a vital centerpiece of this effort as is the reorientation of our campuses to give them greater flexibility in responding to their communities. Other key initiatives include the creation of the Penn State Geisinger Health System, which offers a significant outreach component particularly in its emphasis on wellness and prevention in addition to the delivery of traditional health care services. The World Campus is another important framework for outreach that will not only serve an extended learning community, but provide important new opportunities for faculty research and service, as well. I have just received a report from the Task Force on Research and Technology Transfer at Penn State that offers some suggestions on how to enhance and better integrate these two functions to expand their impact. The increased commitment to internationalize Penn State is yet another dimension of our effort to engage more fully with society. I appreciate the contributions all of you have made to the effort to create an outreach agenda and structure that will advance Penn State’s leadership in serving the Commonwealth and the broader society. It’s time now to move that agenda aggressively forward. The role of the outreach leadership assembled here today is especially critical. That role is to advocate and facilitate an expanded partnership of faculty and staff at every Penn State location with the communities they share. In many cases, you or your staff are the first point of contact with Penn State’s constituents. In others, you hold special expertise in the delivery of programs and services. In every case, you are uniquely positioned in our University community to link Penn State’s vast academic resources with the people who can put them to use. While we have done much to lay the foundation for enhanced outreach, there remain many challenges in implementing this agenda. These are issues of policy, practice and perception. They are the focus of much of your discussion today. They also will be discussed by Penn State’s academic leadership tomorrow [Feb. 5] in the forum for deans and department heads. And they will be an important theme in the broader message that will be shared with the University-wide community in the Penn State Forum tomorrow. All of these sessions, as you know, are the beneficiaries of Peter Magrath’s presence, and I am grateful to Peter for sharing with the Penn State community his perspective on what our University and others can be doing to fulfill their potential for the future. I will introduce Peter to you in just a few moments. But first let me say that such a two-day conversation devoted to outreach is unprecedented in our University. It is my hope that it will energize every part of Penn State to be all that we can be for the future. We have so much to offer. I have stated before my personal conviction that the land-grant university is a fundamental tool for improving the human condition. Surely the establishment of America’s land-grant universities, with their tripartite mission of teaching, research and service, is the single most important development in the history of higher education, one that has proven again and again its value to the progress of the nation and is the envy of higher learning around the world. Our tradition is wonderfully strong. Yet we are entering a new chapter in the evolution of our land-grant institutions. There is emerging a renewed commitment to outreach, to students, to progress, recognizing that higher education must keep up with the profound changes that are taking place in society if universities are to remain centers of learning for the future. If our institutions are not supportive of the learning needs of people of all ages and the expanding knowledge needs of society, other educational enterprises surely will supersede us in this intellectually demanding world—enterprises that won’t have the rich interplay of disciplines and missions that makes the land-grant university so well suited to promote economic, human and cultural progress. This need for relevance and responsiveness is a major thrust of the work of the Kellogg Commission on the 21st Century State and Land-Grant University that I chair. If it were possible to succinctly describe the Commission’s discussion on this point, it would be that to possess these qualities, you’ve got to be where the action is. You can’t be isolated or aloof. You’ve got to reach out—to students, to communities, to businesses, to the public, to countries around the world. It pleases me greatly to be able to say that Penn State is at the leading edge of this change in higher education. We are inventing a new model of what land-grant universities must be and must do in the 21st century. This model centers on the integration of our missions, the rapid deployment of our resources, collaboration across disciplines and delivery units, and partnerships with a wide variety of public and private organizations. Fused with a number of program priorities in areas that impact greatly on the quality of life—areas such as information science and technology; children, youth and families; the life sciences; materials science; and environmental concerns—our model will make a significant contribution to the Commonwealth’s economic and community development and make life better for Pennsylvanians. If you look at the current priorities of our state, we have something to offer in virtually every case. We have something important to offer to technological innovation, to the development of a world-class work force, to health and human services and to competitiveness in the global marketplace. We have expertise in key areas of industry for the future of Pennsylvania, including advanced materials, advanced manufacturing, biomedical products, agribusiness, information technologies, advanced business services, environmental technologies, and tourism and hospitality. We have ample opportunity to deploy our many resources in ways that help the people and communities of this state. I will continue to promote the rapid deployment of Penn State’s resources through the integration of our missions and collaboration across units. If there is something I can do to help you in your efforts to promote outreach at Penn State, please let me know. This is one of the most critical directions for our future. | ||||||||
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