Presidential Charge to the Commission
From Dr. Linwood Rose
December 10, 1998
First, I want to say that my preference, in keeping with the approach we
would like to take with this meeting, is that I share somewhat informally what I would
like this Commission to accomplish. However, this is a significant event in the life
of the University and we want to share my introduction, and ultimately your work, with
other members of the JMU community through the website created for the Commission.
With that preamble, let me share the following prepared remarks.
I want to thank each of you for your willingness to serve the University as a member of
this Commission. While a number of you are faculty, staff or students of JMU and you
are located in Harrisonburg, I am also pleased that we have members of our Commission who
are parents, employers, alumni, and representatives from the City and County.
Senator Miller and Delegate Weatherholtz have agreed to serve as honorary members of
the Commission.
I also want to thank Bob Scott, Al Menard and Geoff Polglase for their leadership in
planning our meetings. Dr. Reynolds and his staff and faculty have done a wonderful
job of juggling space allocations in the building to accommodate our meeting and I want to
thank him for his assistance.
I believe this first meeting will develop the context for our work; I hope that you
will find it inspiring and motivating, and that it will set the stage successfully for
future work.
I would also like to take a few moments to recognize several individuals to whom the
University is indebted for their commitment to leading this effort. Let me introduce
our four committee chairs. They are: JMU faculty members Drs. Karen Forcht, Roger Soenksen
and Kay Knickrehm; and Mr. James Dudley from GTE.
I would also like to introduce our Commission co-chairs: Dr. Virginia Andreoli-Mathie
and Mr. Alexander Berry.
You have often heard, "there is comfort in numbers." You might say,
"I am one of seventy members of this Commission and others can carry the load if I am uncomfortable." But ladies and gentlemen, your place, individually as well as
collectively, is now assured in the history of this institution. Shortly after I
began to think about this Commission and its purpose, I came upon a little booklet that
served as a program for Ron Carrier's presidential inauguration. In the booklet
was a summary of the work of a mission and purpose committee that President Carrier had
appointed. There was also a listing of its members for all to see. These were
individuals that effectively set the tone and direction for this institution for the next
10-20 years. I am pleased to recognize that one of the committee members from 28
years ago is on this Commission today - Joyce Wszalek. Joyce must have been 12 when she
served on that Purpose Committee. So there is no hiding: you will be remembered!
I have already mentioned that we have a diverse group of members on this Commission
from different constituencies. We also have a blend of individuals who know the
University through experience, people who appreciate our roots, as well as young people
and people relatively new to JMU who will offer fresh perspectives.
I have brought you together to begin the work of shaping the future of our University.
As you know we will celebrate our Centennial in just 10 short years. A 100th
birthday represents old age for us as human beings, but as an institution we are still
young - in fact we are still in our formative years - only in adolescence as an
institution of higher learning.
Your charge, your task, is to help me define the characteristics that ought to describe
us as an institution in 2008. Then, I ask you to offer recommendations the
University should consider as we seek to become the institution you define.
How will your efforts be used? The Commission will probably meet as an entire
group on three occasions. In its final meeting to be held in May, it will issue an
advisory report to the president. I, along with the vice presidents and deans, will
consider the report and its recommendations as the foundation of our long range planning
effort. Following our review of the Commission's report, I will take the
results of our collective efforts to the Board of Visitors which will meet in retreat
fashion later in the summer. The desired outcome of the Board retreat will be a
document that defines the university's strategic direction for the next 10-year
period.
How will you be structured to accomplish your charge? The Commission comprises
four Committees. They are: Academic and Student Support Programs; Faculty, Staff and
Student Development; Resources and Infrastructure; and External Constituencies. Each
of you is assigned to one of these committees. Following the initial Commission meeting,
the four committees will all have the same task: to identify 10-15 defining
characteristics of JMU in the year 2008. These lists of characteristics will be
reported to the Commission co-chairs who will attempt to build a consolidated list of
10-20 characteristics.
In the Commission's second meeting to be held in March, the members will formally
agree on the consolidated list and will then go to work in their various committees to
develop recommendations specific to their committee name and purpose. I hope that
you will use campus focus groups and other interest sessions to solicit ideas and
feedback. Once complete, the lists will be forwarded to the Commission co-chairs
again. The co-chairs will then draft a single set of recommendations to take to the
full Commission membership in the final May meeting.
Let me stress something to you as you begin to initiate your work. With only a
few constraints that I will mention in a moment, you have freedom. You are free to
approach this project as artists. I urge you to be creative, to open your
imaginations. We are all victims of our habits and familiar approaches. Warren
Buffett said, "The chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken." How true that is. Perfecting what and how we do things
often serves us well. But I urge you to look beyond what we now know, how we now
behave. As Gary Hamel and Jeff Sampler have observed, "Irrelevancy is a bigger risk than inefficiency." Two more miles per gallon may not be enough. Let
me illustrate my point with a two minute video clip from "Raiders of the Lost Ark." (Indiana Jones is confronted by a master swordsman brandishing his
weapons and threatening Indy's imminent demise. Indy sighs, pulls out his pistol, and shoots the swordsman.)
Now that's a paradigm shift. Perfecting swordsmanship is of no use when
faced with gunpowder and a bullet! We want to perform what we do better, but we must
be aware of new thoughts and ideas, new concepts that can transform our world.
I mentioned that there are a few constraints. I prefer to call them guides.
They represent the soul of this University. I suppose you would refer to them
as values or beliefs. They offer comfort as we seek to find our way in a
rapidly-changing environment. I propose them to you as a foundation for your
visioning. If as a result of your discussions you really believe that a modification
of values and beliefs or purpose needs to be made, please feel free to make such
recommendations.
So, let me suggest that you consider the following as you chart our future course:
- Students are at the heart of our University. Their total development guides our decisions. They are valued as individuals. They are partners in the learning experience in which we challenge and support them. We devote ourselves to their potential and to their promise.
- The strength of the University is derived from the contributions of its members. E Pluribus Unum - from many, one.
- In the pursuit of excellence we reach beyond our grasp, we push the limits, we exceed beyond expectations.
Our purpose - simply stated but not so simply accomplished - is to develop
educated citizens. Jefferson and Madison recognized that an enduring feature of our
society must be an enlightened or educated citizenry. We want our graduates to lead
productive lives so that they might provide for themselves and their families, but we also
want them to lead meaningful lives, as caring contributors to the advancement of our
society. We want our students to advance intellectually, to add to their knowledge
base, but we also want our students to develop their skills so that they might function
effectively in society - in short, as educated citizens.
My only other constraint or restriction is that you recognize that serious artists take
their art seriously. Be creative. Be imaginative, but realize how important your
work is. I want you to be proud to be able to sign this masterpiece. I just
finished "Timequake," by Kurt Vonnegut.v The premise of his book is that a
timequake occurs that forces humanity to relive - for a 10-year period - all the
implications of the decisions they made previous to the quake. Ask yourself, if you
knew that you had to "live" the results of your recommendations twice, would you
make the same recommendation?
Now let me close my charge to you by showing another video clip which I believe
powerfully demonstrates what I would like for you to now do. (Jodie Foster, in
"Contact," is told by a governing board that her work sounds more like science
fiction than science and is not worthy of funding. She argues convincingly that
vision - and support for vision - enabled airplanes, rockets and space
exploration, all of which might have been doomed to be "just science fiction"
had they had been dismissed as wild ideas. In the end, she is granted funding.)
Your names were not drawn out of a hat for this work. You were hand picked,
carefully selected! I have great confidence in your individual and collective
ability. Think big!
It is now my great pleasure to introduce Dr. Margaret Miller to you. Dr. Miller
is currently the President of the American Association of Higher Education. Dr.
Miller's own academic background includes degrees from the some of the best
institutions on the left and right coasts: UCLA, Stanford, and The University of Virginia.
She has been a professor of English, a campus administrator and the chief academic
officer at the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia, where we of course go to
know her. She has been a champion of assessment and of the development, and use, of
indicators of institutional effectiveness.
Peg has advised university systems in Hungary, Wisconsin, Maryland, and Puerto Rico.
She has presented to the Education Commission of the States, the National Goals
Forum, the National Governor's Association, the State Higher Education executive
Officers, and the U.S. Department of Education. As President of AAHE Peg has been an
articulate and outspoken leader for higher education, and we are very proud of her
accomplishments.
I asked Dr. Miller, and she graciously agreed, to spend almost an hour with us in a
seminar/discussion group format. She will take a few minutes to share some thoughts
about issues facing higher education on a national scale, but then she has agreed to
respond to questions and enter into a discussion of issues relevant to our planning at
JMU. It is not often that we are able to have the benefit of sharing with an
individual who has the experience and perspective of Peg Miller and I hope you will join
me in welcoming her to our campus.