Higher-education czar visits Faculty Senate
By Chelsea Toy
September 11, 2008
The high quality of Ohio’s institutions of higher education is the key to alleviating the state’s economic woes and will determine Ohio’s economic future, Chancellor of the Ohio Board of Regents Eric Fingerhut told Ohio University’s Faculty Senate Monday night in Walter Hall.
Fingerhut spoke to Faculty Senate in order to commend faculty on the job they are doing and to encourage them to use their abilities and their research to further the economic development of the state of Ohio through the year-old University System of Ohio.
“No question about it, this is a tough economic time in the state of Ohio and in the nation,” said Fingerhut. “We are the solution to the economic challenges the state faces.”
In his address, Fingerhut said that the 14 public universities and 23 community colleges with over 475,000 students are the state’s greatest resources. The high-quality research, affordability and flexibility of Ohio’s public institutions will make it easier for Ohioans to obtain degrees and will also attract out-of-state and international students to the University System of Ohio, Fingerhut said.
“For anybody, we have in Ohio what they need,” said Fingerhut.
He asked that faculty collaborate with rather than compete against other schools in the University System of Ohio in order to build up the state’s economy and the prestige of the system. He said that Ohio’s public universities should be on similar academic calendars, that students should be able to transfer seamlessly from community colleges to universities, and that universities must identify centers of excellence to highlight programs that can be promoted both inside and outside of Ohio.
Another way public universities can help drive the state’s economy is through industrial research, Fingerhut said. He proposed that business leaders and researchers meet regularly to determine the needs of industry within the state.
After Fingerhut said industrial research could be a large source of revenue for the state, several faculty members questioned whether research in the humanities or other areas not traditionally valuable to industry would fall to the wayside. Fingerhut assured them that all areas of research are important for success in the global economy.
“Leverage whatever you do for the benefit of the state,” Fingerhut told faculty members who were worried that their work might not be of industrial value. “The collective power of the faculty is an enormous asset to the state.”
Hajrudin Pasic, a professor of engineering, asked Fingerhut whether the University System of Ohio is considering expanding into campuses overseas, such as other schools such as New York University have done. Fingerhut said he is very interested in developing opportunities throughout the globe to better serve Ohio in the global economy.
“The most global institutions we have are universities,” Fingerhut said. In the global economy, he noted that academic exchange could “put Ohio on the map."
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