At the direction of President B. Joseph White, officials and faculty members at the three campuses are preparing contingency operating plans for the next six- to eight-month period. State revenues are soft, disbursements from the state are slow and “we can’t rule out a rescission,” White said at the Nov. 13 UI Board of Trustees meeting, and added that the policy council would prepare plans in early December and the trustees would be briefed thereafter. Protecting academic quality, ensuring that students get the courses they need to graduate on time and that patients get the health care they rely on are the plans’ guiding principles, White said.
The provosts of the three campuses – Linda Katehi, Urbana; Michael Tanner, UIC; and Harry Berman, UIS – reported on programs aimed at improving outcomes for minority students and recruiting minority students and faculty members. The Chicago and Urbana campuses rank first and second respectively among Committee on Institutional Cooperation schools for their numbers of African American and Hispanic students, with UIC’s minority undergraduate population at 25.2 percent, Urbana’s at 13.9 percent, and UIS’s at 14.3 percent.
While UIC’s percentage of undergraduates from under-represented groups has remained constant over the past eight years, UIC consistently ranks among the top five research universities for undergraduate diversity and first or second among the nation’s 50 leading research universities for the diversity of its graduate and professional schools.
During the 2007-2008 academic year, Urbana made more than 350 high-school visits, especially targeting the Chicago area. Katehi and Chancellor Richard Herman recently convened Project 2012: Transforming Illinois, Re-envisioning Diversity and Inclusion, a cross-campus committee focused on recruiting and retaining exceptional faculty members and students. During AY08-09, about 650 students, more than 78 percent of whom are minorities, are being assisted with their educational expenses by Illinois Promise, a program started by Herman in 2005 that ensures access to an Illinois education for low-income, in-state students. Additionally, 122 minority faculty members – 117 of whom remain on campus – have been hired through the Target of Opportunity program.
In other business, the trustees approved:
- Extending White’s employment contract through June 30, 2011, with no other contract modifications. White has been president since Feb. 1, 2005.
- The appointments of Ruth Watkins, currently vice provost and a professor of speech and hearing science at Urbana, as Harry E. Preble Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences effective Jan. 1; and M. Tamer Basar as interim director at the Beckman Institute, effective Nov. 16. Basar’s appointments include the Swanlund Endowed Chair in Electrical and Computer Engineering and Center for Advanced Study Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering.
- Establishing the private limited company Singapore Pte. Ltd., (“Illinois Singapore”) to implement an agreement with the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) and establish a major technology research center in Singapore in conjunction with the Urbana campus.
- Awarding several contracts related to construction of the Petascale Computing Facility: a $5.6 million contract to Core Construction Services of Illinois, Morton, for general work; a $5.7 million contract for heating and air conditioning work as well as a $1.4 million contract for ventilation work to A and R Mechanical Contractors, Champaign; and a $7.1 million contract to Bodine Electric of Champaign for electrical work. The $72.5 million petascale facility, under construction at the corner of St. Mary’s Road and Oak Street in Champaign, will house the Blue Waters Data Processing Center.
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