On Saturday, December 19, NDSU held the first commencement since the “retirement” of Forum Man of the Year Joseph chapman.  Presiding over the ceremonies was interim president Dr. Richard Hanson.

Anyone that has not been to a major(well, in this case, maybe semi-major) college graduation shuold go, at leatt once.  They are colorful, precise and a true ceremonial tribute to the students, faculty and institution.  It is much more interesting if you know someone that is being awarded a degree.  Also, NDSU is almost unique in institutions of higher learning in that there are no outside speakers.  A couple of hours ofn watching people walk across a stage is boredom enough, I guess.  Not all universities award all the degrees individually.  When I got my PhD at the University of Minnesota, the university had about 60,000 students, and the spring commencement awarded about 10,00 degrees.  so individual awards were not possible, except for the PhD’s(but not the MD’s).

The proceedings start with the processional, first of the faculty.  I sometimes wish I didn’t have to watch this part from the inside, as each faculty member wears a PhD gown with a large hood with the colors of blue(for philosophy) and the colors of the institution were the PhD was rewarded, in my case, maroon and gold.  Oh, yes, they march by seniority, which means not how long at NDSU, but how long at NDSU with their present rank.  Some universities have thieir own gowns with other colors than black, and the same for the cap.  It is wuite a colorful sight.

Thjen comes the “stage party,” consisting of the president, academic vice president, the deans of the several colleges along with the Distinguished Professors, in this case a member of the State Board of Higher Education, some people that read names, all lead by the Presiding Officer of the University Senate, carrying the mace that is the symbol of authority of the university, symbolizing that the ral autority of the university lies with the University Senate.  Then, of course the students, who march be degree and college.

President Hanson made a few opening remarks.  He commented that this exercise was the most important day of the fall semester, and that this day would be the most important in the careers of the degree recipients thus far.  Of course, he congratulated everyone on their work ethic, perseverance, etc.  Greetings were also presented by Sue Andrews of the State Board of Higher Education.  Finally, before the awarding of degrees, there were remarks by a representative of the graduating class, Patricia Romaine.  I’m not sure when this tradition got started, but I think it an excellent one.

The degrees were then awarded, with the highest(PhD’s) first and moving down, if I can use that word here: I don’t think of any of these degrees as down, to the Bachelors degrees. Most institutions do it the other way around.  In the spring, there are actually two different ceremony’s, one for advanced degrees and one for the undergraduate degrees.  There’s a reason for this, which I’ll explain in a bit.

Then there is applause, the playing and singing of the “school song,,” The Yellow and the Green.  Then the recessional, of course, followed by a reception in the concourse of the Dome.

I always feel good for a couple of days aftr attending one of these events, possibly because I take my own advice and don’t go unless someone close to me is graduating, in this a very special student of mine that actually got two degrees(BS and MS) degrees, and this was no exception.  I also was gladdened byu the fact that no one from the Athletic Department was present, threw was no mention of athletics, except for the last line of the description in the program of Dr. Hanson’s credentials, where it was mentioned that he had played for the Bison and the New York Giants.

I promised I would explain the inverted order of the awarding of degrees.  I hate to bring this up in such a positive, but to me it is symbolic of what appears to me(and many of my colleagues) is the total lack of understanding and therefore respect the population of North Dakota has for higher education.

NDSU used to use the more popular of lowest to highest, but by the time the graduate degrees were awarded, most of the parents and the like had left their seats and were milling around the stage talking and laughing, taking pictures and the like, creating such a ruckus that the announcer could not be heard over the din.  Contrast that with the ceremony in Minneapolis when my PhD was conferred.  There was complete silence until it was over, at which point we got a standing ovation.  From everybody.

Even in this ceremony, when each degree was awarded, there would be four or five people in the audience that felt they had to yell and shout.  Most of my colleagues in my neighborhood did not appreciate this, and neither did I.  Usually, there is announcement to hold the applause until the end, but there wasn’t this time.  In my experience, it doesn’t matter.  In case I did not make the point clear, this is supposed to be a solemn, formal occasion.  Shouts in the middle are not called for nor appreciated.

These events are always learning experiences for me; a chance to join in the congratulation of the graduates, renew acquaintances among my colleagues and administrators, and in my case, to visit with former students that are now faculty.  I definitely recommend attendance at a commencement if someone close to you is graduating.

Recently, as we all know, Joseph Chapman

unexpectedly and suddenly resigned as president of North Dakota State University.  There was, at the time, a controversy about cost overruns on his new house and his $22K trip to O’Bama’s inauguration.  However, the suddenness of the resignation and the speed with which the State Board iof Higher Education accepted the resignation makes one wonder if there isn’t much more that might bear scrutiny.  In fact, I have heard from leaders of the University Senate, the actual governing body of the University, that all we have seen is a very small tip of the iceberg.  However, since I’m not aware of other issues, I will not speculate what more there might be.

The local media was filled with interviews with faculty, students, and, of all people, Bison athletics fans.  This last I think significant, and I must say that the media must know a radically different group of faculty and students than I do.

President Chapman is not extremely popular among the faculty.  It is important, I think, to note that he is not the “boss” of the faculty in any sense.  The University is governed be the University Senate, which is primarily composed of elected and appointed faulty representatives. There are two staff members and five students, but the rest of the Senate, well over 40 members, I think, are faculty.  I think the proper perspective is gained by noting that the Mace, the symbol of the University’s authority, is carried at graduations by the presiding officer of the University Senate.

Much has been made of all of Chapman’s so-called accomplishments.  I’m not sure how many accomplishments of NDSU are actually his.  Sure, one gets that impression by reading the Forum and watching the local news on television, but it seems to me that they get most, if not all, of their information from Chapman’s office.

Now I happen to know Chapman reasonably well, as well as several other administrators and lots of faculty and students at NDSU.  From first hand experience I can say that despite his smiling veneer, Chapman is the type of leader that doesn’t receive mail he doesn’t want to receive, doesn’t answer questions he doesn’t like, and will avoid situations that might turn confrontational.  Never fear, I can prove all of these things, but decline to be specific in keeping with the more’s of this site.

Chapman arrived on campus eleven years ago, trumpeting the advantages of moving to division one in athletics.  He assured us that this would help the faculty to obtain grant funds, and besides, that’s what are peer institutions do.  When it was pointed out to him that the type of athletic teams NDSU play do not come from NDSU’s academic peers, he responded he meant Land Grant Schools.  Well, South Carolina State and North Carolina A&T are land grant schools, a fact which Chapman denied, citing that Clemson, for example, is the land grant school in South Carolina.  Unfortunately, Chapman was apparently unaware that in the southeastern United States, each state has two land grant schools(”separate but equal”).  Alright, so the athletic department hired a consulting firm to study whether NDSU should go division one or not.  Sure enough, this firm recommended a move to division one.  A poll of the members of the University Senate showed that a majority opposed such a move.  Athletic Director Gene Taylor went so far as to claim that this same consulting had surveyed the faculty and discovered that a majority favored such a move, and even wouldn’t object tro appropriated funds being spent on a division one program.  Of course, no such questions wre actually asked of the faculty, and Taylor somehow bvelieved the University Senate would believe him when he said they(apparently the athletic department) had come to that conclusion on their own based on other un-named responses.

One might wonder how this move was accomplished if the University Senate was opposed.  Simple.  No apoproriated funds were involved: the money was all to come from donations to the Development Foundation and Teamakers.  So, according to Chapman, it was none of the Senate’s business.

Now, about athletics.  The athletic program has virtually nothing to do with academics, and certainly nothing to do with the availability of external funds to faculty for their research.  Chapman made a big thing about NDSU becoming a Carnegie 2 research Institution, but neglected to note that despite tremendous problems, such as poor or non-existent laboratory facilities or research library, the faculty does pretty well with its research.  Many of the best research institutions(e.g University of Chicago, NYU, Carnegie Mellon, case Western Reserve, Caltech to name a few) have very minor or non-existent athletic programs.

So despite the fact that the media claimed that the decision of NDSU(actually, Chapman and the athletic program) to move to division one as “the most important in the school’s history,” the move to division one athletics did not benefit the educational or research programs one iota.

Now, what  of his other “accomplishments?”  He himself haws talked publicly both within and without the University about the excitement of the 14,000 enrollment.  Many do view this as a positive development.  Why?  There has been no increase in faculty or facilities to accommodate these students.  I have heard many faculty complain that the quality of NDSU’s undergraduates has decreased as a result, although I haven’t observed this nor am I able to verify it.

This is a crucial issue.  All this hype about the athletic program has clouded the fact that NDSU remains desperately underfunded.  I will focus on one important department which I will not name, but is crucial to almost every academic program at the University.  This department has ten assistant professors out of a faculty of sixteen.  In 2004, at the request of the NDSU administration, this department was reviewed by a faculty member from the University of Nebraska.  His conclusion was that this department needed 21 faculty minimum in order to perform its function, and that dramatic salary increases wre needed to retain the very well qualified faculty.  Evidentially much of this has gone unaddressed, since the inordinately large number of junior faculty are a result of having to replace more senior, well qualified faculty that have moved on to better funded situations.  So, I don’t think more students means a better institution, but continually losing qualified faculty due to low salary and facilities is not an accomplishment.

Now, how about research?  It is true that external funding has increased across campus, but I don’t think Chapman had much to do with it.  In several department at least, older, non-research faculty have retired to be replaced with younger faculty, more schooled and experienced in research.  The resulting increase in research capability has naturally resulted in an increase in extra mural funding for research.

The research park does not impress me much.  There is some research that goes on there, but I don’t think much o0f it has to do with the University.  Alien Technologies doesn’t do any, and has 34 $9 an hour jobs to add to the local economy.

So, unless one wants to to include athletics, I don’t see much in the way of benefit NDSU has received from Chapman’s tenure.  And I don’t see any connection between academics and athletics anywhere, except on NDSU’s webpage, a fact which infuriates many faculty.

How did this happen?  People think athletics have something to do with academics, and the search committee that sent Chapman’s name to the State Board of Higher Education did not include any faculty members.  In fact, Bruce Furness was the chair of the committee.  Nothing against the former mayor of Fargo, but what does he know about higher education.  For that matter, what does the State Board, composed primarily of political appointees, know about higher education.

Chapman is not, I think, without his accomplishments, however.  I think now people understand that NDSU is the true flagship state university.  I think there have been several departments added to the institution to give it a true university flavor.  But everything still remains desperately and critically underfunded, and it is the President’s job to address that.  In my view, he hasn’t.  He has done some fund raising, but much of it for the athletic program, and by mishandling of the situation, has, I think, damaged the chances of his successor to seek donations.

So what’s the bottom line to this?  The University has been hurt by hiring a fundraiser that concentrated on athletics and not on the academic and research programs that are the real business of the University.  In other words, the emphasis on athletics, both by Chapman and the media nad the population has in fact been detrimental to the growth in quality of the University.

WASHINGTON — President Obama urged the nation on Tuesday to see the economic crisis as reason to raise its ambitions, calling for expensive new efforts to address energy, health care and education even as he warned that government bailouts have not come to an end.

In his first address to a joint session of Congress, Mr. Obama mixed an acknowledgment of the depth of the economic problems with a Reaganesque exhortation to American resilience. He offered an expansive agenda followed by a pledge to begin paring an ever-climbing budget deficit. Read more

“there are no institutions of higher learning that have as part of their mission statements “entertain the local population by having athletic teams.”

By:The Norwegian Explorer

A recent local topic of discussion is the consideration of the North Dakota Legislature somehow requiring the football teams of NDSU and UND to play each other on an annual basis.  Even though I don’t care if the two institutions ever play each other again in anything, or for that matter even have football teams, or even athletic programs, I think that if the legislature considers such an act it would be right up there with when the Tennessee legislature decreed that the irrational number pi is, in fact 3.

First, according to ESPN, there are no institutions of higher learning that have as part of their mission statements “entertain the local population by having athletic teams.”  What would be the content of such legislation if one or both of the institutions decided to drop football a la Western Washington, or follow the lead of some of the finest research universities, e.g. University of Chicago, University of Rochester, Carnegie Mellon to name a few, and eliminate athletics altogether?

This, of course, is not likely to happen. But let’s suppose such legislation does become law.  In that case, we would have the situation where the legislature has interfered in the internal affairs of it’s flagship institutions, a clear violation of the academic freedom of both institutions and one or more of their academic departments(yes, the Athletic Department is an academic department).  This could besmirch the academic reputations of the schools to the level of affecting their ability to attract outside funding for their research.

OK, so you don’t care if the schools are any good or not.  Fine.  But when NDSU went to Division 1 athletics the case was made by President Chapman when speaking to the NDSU University Senate that the funding was coming entirely from outside donations, and was therefore none of the Senate’s business.  Well, if the football teams are funded primarily by private donations, what business is it of the legislature’s whom or if they play?  And some say the smoking ban violates their individual rights.

In summary, I have no dog in the fight of whether NDSU and UND play each other in anything.  But I think that if the legislature meddles in the situation, it would serve no-one and possibly harm all parties.