McDavis seeks to explain, not justify, university issues
By Jason Robinaugh, Staff Writer
April 19, 2007 | 4 p.m.
President Roderick J. McDavis held an open forum April 4 in Bromley Hall with students to discuss various topics of students’ concerns.
More than thirty students gathered to ask the president questions, to make requests of him, and to listen to what other students--and McDavis himself--had to say.
McDavis began by briefly reflecting on his own days as a student at OU, where he completed his undergraduate studies in 1970, and then explained exactly what he does as president.
“Basically what I’m responsible for is the entire institution from the standpoint of leadership and from the standpoint of management,” he said, elaborating on his frequent meetings with vice presidents, faculty, the provost and the dean. “It’s a twelve-hour-a-day job, seven days a week, three-hundred-sixty-five days in the year.”
After his introduction, McDavis opened the floor for questions from students (who will remain anonymous).
Major issues (no pun intended)
Students began by expressing concerns about the arts. One question involved the Art Education major and its being moved from the College of Fine Arts into the College of Education.
“Typically, what happens in every academic unit is that you try to look at the number of majors that you have versus the cost of the program from the standpoint of how to make a good decision about ‘Is this a program that you hold on to?’ or ‘Are there other programs where you can divert those resources, where there are more students?’” McDavis explained. “It’s almost a case of probably the college wishing it could increase the enrollment but not having a lot of success in doing that and then having to make a decision about how to create an opportunity for students who want to teach art to go through the College of Education and to do that.”
McDavis further explained that such decisions are done on the college level, not the university level, but that he “ask[s] a lot of questions” to make sure that the college is making the right decisions about which majors to keep and which to expunge.
Another major-related concern raised by students was the problem faced in many departments of certain courses being offered only once each year.
“I would say that’s probably the biggest issue in the music school,” one student told the president. “I had to be here six years, total.”
According to OU’s Office of Institutional Research, the College of Fine Arts has an average retention rate each year of 84 percent, the third lowest university-wide (Arts & Sciences average 79 percent and University College averages 74 percent).
“We realize that that’s a real problem,” McDavis responded. “The challenge that we face is, given the economic situation that we face within our institution, that oftentimes departments and schools can only offer courses once a year, so they either offer it in the fall, winter, or spring, and so you have to wait that next cycle before those courses come back.”
Budget issues
Several questions arose throughout the hour regarding the idea that the construction of Baker University Center, which cost $60 million, has caused OU’s tremendous debt; President McDavis was quick to dispel such rumors.
“It’s not about that,” he said, explaining that the funding for Baker Center’s construction was raised through a fund separate from that used for normal operating and building costs.
“There are two streams of funding that we receive from Columbus, from the legislature. There is one sort of bucket of money that’s for buildings only. The only purpose of that money is to build buildings, and it’s called capital funds, so every year we submit our request for capital funds, and we are in receipt of those funds that cannot be spent on salaries, on operating expenses, can only be spent on buildings,” McDavis explained. “Some state funding out of the Capital went for [the construction of Baker Center], but we’re not paying for that out of our operating expenses.”
McDavis further elaborated on the cause of the university’s debt, spending more time on the topic than on any other of the evening.
“Each year we get what’s called a state subsidy, and that subsidy has either stayed the same or decreased. The other thing that’s happened is that our costs have gone up every year,” he said, taking on a sort of teacher-like role, using hand motions and a calm, patient voice. “That creates a gap, the gap between what you receive in subsidy and the cost.”
Citing this ever-growing gap as the reason for annual tuition raises, McDavis provided examples such as an upcoming 10 percent raise in employee healthcare costs and an 11 percent raise in utility costs as more fuel in the fire.
“Last year we realigned our budget. We saw a deficit coming for this year that was going to be nine million dollars. We realigned our budget by fourteen million dollars. We created a 6.2 million dollar reserve that was done on the basis of eliminating a deficit for 07,” he said. “What we said was that all things being the same we would not have a problem with the go-forward basis. We didn’t meet our enrollment target from the standpoint of transfers, and our retention rate was down by one percent…you avoid a problem if all things stay the same. They did not stay the same.”
Residence Life issues
Students brought up multiple concerns about different residence halls and their policies. As the forum was held in Bromley Hall, the students present were primarily Bromley residents, and the building’s physical status was a hot topic.
“I was having students wondering why we’re allowed to live here with asbestos in the building,” a Bromley resident assistant told the president.
Another student chimed in with, “The ceilings are falling in in the closets.”
“That’s not good,” McDavis said. “I can tell you that if there was a health problem, we certainly wouldn’t allow students to live here.”
In addition to Bromley’s situation, another student expressed a problem with summer housing, which for the past two years has been in Washington Hall.
“[Washington Hall] is a distinctly non-accessible building. In fact it says on the front of the building, ‘This building is not wheelchair accessible,’” the student, who is handicapped, told McDavis. “It’s not a good message to send to people.”
“It’s fortunate for us this evening that we have the Vice President for Student Affairs in this room,” McDavis said to soothe the dissatisfied students. “He just heard what you said and he made a note about it.” Throughout the forum, both McDavis and Kent Smith took notes on each issue, and at the end of the forum, McDavis told the students that they would “follow up” on each.
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For more information on the office of the President, see his Web site.
For more information on Ohio University’s budget, visit its Web site.