Remarks of Linwood H. Rose
President, James Madison University
Greater Madison Fall Banquet
October 12, 2000

My congratulations to Dean Ehlers and my thanks to Greater Madison for honoring Dean with the Distinguished Service Award. There is clearly no one who more appropriately deserves an award for "Distinguished Service" to JMU than Dean Ehlers.

His impact on our athletic program - and on the institution as a whole - has been an incredibly positive factor. We're all grateful to you, Dean. Thank you again on behalf of James Madison University.

This evening, I want to briefly summarize the state of the university, but I would like to spend most of our time together sharing some thoughts about the future of one of our programs, teacher preparation.

Let me begin tonight where the University's year began, the opening weekend. The relationship between the university and the Harrisonburg community is extremely important to me. I am not a CEO who just came in from LA or Miami with no ties to the Harrisonburg. I have been in Harrisonburg my entire professional life and it is painful to consider the deterioration in relationships that transpired this year. As members of this community and as supporters of the university, I want to assure you that we are working within the university and with the city not only to avert a replay of this fall, but also to promote a healthier relationship in general. We will deal with the actions and reactions, but more importantly we must address the root causes. As a university, I think it appropriate that we set a higher standard for behavior than that required by the law. The law should be a minimum threshold. As I have said, the problems of alcohol abuse are not going to be solved overnight, but through alternative events, through education, and through disciplinary intervention, we are working to address these problems.

Another familiar characteristic of the opening of the new academic year is the traffic, both vehicular and pedestrian. To help improve the main street crossing situation we have relocated the school of media arts and design to the east side of campus and by the first of the year we also plan to relocate the Speech Communication program. These changes will not completely eliminate mid-street crossings, but they should certainly help.

JMU and Harrisonburg are inseparable partners in a multitude of ways. Each can enrich and benefit the other. I ask all of you here to join in an effort to make the relationship an even closer one.

We have opened the new year with 15,000 students. Our new students were selected from an applicant pool of over 15,000 applications - certainly a visible measure of institutional strength. We have enrolled our first undergraduate Fulbright Scholar from Cyprus.

We have added a cadre of new faculty who have brought new energy, new ideas and new knowledge to our classrooms and labs. Our faculty have continued to innovate. The latest examples being a doctoral degree in communication sciences and disorders and a new undergraduate major in e-commerce, approved by the Board of Visitors just two weeks ago.

We have again benefited from high rankings in national publications. For the seventh year in a row, the highly-regarded poll on academic quality conducted by U.S. News & World Report ranked JMU as the Number 1 public regional university in the South. Among all comprehensive universities in the South - private and public - we moved up a notch from a tie for Number 3 to a tie for Number 2.

We have opened the largest and most expensive I might add, academic facility on our campus, the second academic building on the east campus, for the health and human services programs. We are constructing the Leeolou Alumni Center, a new conference center that will provide a wonderful venue for events such as these, and we are building more parking - both surface lots and the parking deck adjacent to the stadium. We are planning the third academic building for CISAT, the renovation of Harrison Hall, and an athletic performance facility to enhance Bridgeforth Stadium.

This year we increased annual giving to the University by $500,000 over last year's giving and as you know we recently announced our second million dollar, or greater, gift to the University in two years from Alvin and Nancy Baird. Long time friends and supporters, the Roops, committed an additional half-million dollars to the professorship and scholarships they had previously created.

All of the preliminary work is also well underway to prepare us for a major fund raising campaign so that we might establish the faculty chairs and professorships needed to attract and retain the best faculty. So that we might secure the brightest students through increased scholarship support, and so that we might provide the facilities we so badly need to enhance the experiences of our students in the arts and in athletics.

The planning and construction of the last decade has been directed to programs in the sciences and technology, just as the decade before saw improvements in Education and Business. The vision for the sciences is not yet complete - planned projects need to be constructed - but no one would question our success in building superb facilities on our eastern border. It is now time to shift our facility planning priorities again and I believe our most creative efforts should now be focused on designing facilities for the fine and performing arts on our western border that will be just as grand as those on this side of the interstate. At times, the pace of capital project progress seems painfully slow, but our entire campus is a picture of dreams turned into reality - We can do it again!

What we have done in the sciences, in technology and in information management exemplifies the responsiveness of this university to the needs of our region, our state and the nations. In five short years we have increased the number of graduates in technology-related fields by 452%. 129-712.

I believe that it is now imperative that we focus our effort on responding to another critical need. In Virginia and around the country we now find ourselves facing a tremendous shortage of k-12 school teachers - particularly in the sciences, but in all other academic areas as well. Are there going to be enough teachers to handle the demands of the high technology the 21^st Century is bringing?

When asked who had the greatest impact on your life. Other than our parents, we invariably answer by citing the name of a particularly inspiring, or challenging teacher. Certainly a teacher who knew the subject matter, but beyond that, someone who made learning come alive. At some level in our educational experience - in grade school, high school or college - each of us had that one very special teacher . . . the person whose guidance and knowledge made a profound and lasting impression on our lives.

John Woody of the JMU School of Media Arts and Design has put together a short video that features testimonials from six members of Greater Madison who reflect on their memories of that very special teacher.

While you are watching, take a moment and think back - think back about the one teacher who made the big difference in your life. I am confident that you will identify with their memories and their comments.

Could we have the video please.

Can I make a more compelling case for good teachers than that?

Put plainly, We are facing the largest teacher shortage in history. More than a million veteran teachers are nearing retirement. Half the teachers who will be needed in public school classrooms 10 years from now have not yet been hired.

Nationwide, some 2.4 million teachers will be needed in the next decade because of teacher attrition and retirement and increased student enrollment. I have heard our senatorial and presidential candidates talk about the number of teacher positions they either created or will create, but we are now at a point where the greater problem is creating the teachers, not establishing the positions. These candidates should be talking about what is needed to restore to the teaching profession those ingredients essential to attracting some our best young minds to the profession.

By 2008, public school enrollment will exceed 54 million, an increase of nearly two million children over today. Enrollment in elementary schools is expected to increase by 17 percent and in high school by 26 percent.

In addition to the pending retirements of veteran teachers, there is tremendous turnover among young teachers. Twenty percent of all new hires leave teaching within three years. In urban districts, close to 50 percent of newcomers flee the profession during their first five years of teaching.

Virginia is far from immune from the teacher shortage problem. Already many school districts in the state are unable to fill openings with qualified teachers. The approximate 3,500 graduates of teacher education programs within Virginia are not nearly sufficient to meet the demand of about 8,000 new teachers per year.

There are obviously a multitude of reasons for the less-than-adequate numbers of students entering the teaching profession and the high turnover of those already in the classroom. The one overriding reason, however, is clearly salary.

On the average, the beginning teacher makes in the mid to upper 20 thousand dollar range. New engineering graduates and computer scientists start with salaries well into the 40s and higher.

While starting salaries are a problem, clearly a bigger problem is the salary for an experienced teacher. Teachers aged in their mid-40s to 50s earn approximately $30,000 less per year than their peers with similar educations.

We are committed at JMU to do everything within our powers as educators to help provide a steady flow of qualified teachers for our nation's youth.

At James Madison University, our roots as an educational institution are in the preparation of teachers. This was our reason for coming into existence in 1908 and I can assure you that teacher preparation is just as important to Linwood Rose at James Madison University in the year 2000 as it was to Julian Burruss at the State Normal and Industrial School for Women at Harrisonburg when it opened its doors in the fall of 1909.

President Burruss was here before the institution proudly bore the name of James Madison, but I am sure he would agree fully with the words of Madison on the need for education.

To quote Mr. Madison: "Learned institutions ought to be favorite objects with every free people . . . it is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can be permanently a free people."

James Madison University exists because the Commonwealth of Virginia wanted an institution of higher learning in the Valley of Virginia that would specialize in training skilled and erudite teachers for the public schools.

We remain true to the directive set forth by the Commonwealth 92 years ago.

Many things have changed at JMU in those years. The academic offerings have expanded enormously - into the liberal arts, the fine arts and performing arts, the sciences, communications, technology, business and health and human services.

But at the traditional heart of JMU's program has always been the teacher education program. We have always been, and continue to be committed to preparing the finest teachers possible.

Our teacher education program has been the standard for quality in the Commonwealth for nearly a century and the program continues to play a major role in the overall mission of the University.

Nearly 1,400 students are involved in teacher programs at JMU - about 10 percent of the student body. JMU annually leads the state in the number of teachers receiving their initial licensure to teach.

There are a multitude of superlative programs in teacher education. To mention a few:

• Our early childhood education program has been a model for Virginia for a half-century or more.
• The middle education program has done a superb job of moving the emphasis of its programs to the concept of middle-school philosophy from the older junior high school approach.
• We clearly have the premier music education program in the state. Look around the high schools in Virginia and I suspect that you will find that more band directors and music teachers are from JMU than any other college or university.
• Our programs meet the needs of society. Our education administrators and faculty are constantly in touch with school superintendents to make certain that our programs are meeting current needs of the schools. A good example is a new program on teaching English as a second language. With the changing demographics of Virginia, this has become an important element of many Virginia school districts.

James Madison University is poised not only to continue its tradition of providing our state and nation with outstanding teachers, but also to play a leading role in emphasizing the importance of the teaching profession. I intend to assist our faculty in championing the key role of the teacher in our society. We will seek out funding to support efforts to enhance student interest in the teaching profession. We will continue our work with school districts in providing in-service training for practicing teachers, and we will work with community leaders, people like yourselves, to help restore the prominence to the teaching profession that it deserves.

Our society must place a higher value on the role that our teachers play. The future of our communities and our nation depends on an educated and enlightened population.

We need the influence of outstanding teachers - not average teachers, not mediocre teachers, but outstanding teachers - to prepare our children and grandchildren for the future. None of this can be accomplished without cost, but the cost of not doing what must be done will be far greater. As Jefferson said, an ignorant and free nation cannot exist. An educated populous is a prerequisite of a democratic society.

In closing tonight, I would like to share a television commercial with you. It was produced by the Bank of America. Some of you may have seen it. It conveys a powerful message about the need for teachers in our society, and it illustrates the kind of leadership one business is willing to take to make it more desirable to be a teacher. I commend them on their action and hope that others will follow their lead.

Just as they might be doctors, lawyers or financiers children need to be encouraged to be teachers. Our society depends upon it! Thank you for your continued support of JMU and God bless you.

I would now like to ask our six movie stars; Lois Forbes, Alex Gabbin, Mickey Mathews, Chip McIntyre, Gail O'Donnell, and Audrey Smith to stand and be recognized.

Two of the teachers mentioned in the video are also with us tonight and I would like them to stand and be recognized: John Wood, a retired member of the JMU faculty and Mr. Henry Buhl, a teacher at Harrisonburg High School.

I would also like all the teachers in the audience, active or retired to stand and let us recognize you. Finally, I would like to introduce John Woody to you. John is an Associate Professor of Media Arts and Design and he spends countless late nights on projects like the one you have seen tonight. Thank you.