ladies and gentlemen welcome to the 2020
UNL state of our University address
we're proud to present the university's
varsity Men's Chorus
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by
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Chancellor green will take your
questions following today's state of the
University address please write them on
the cards provided or email them to sou
questions at un-led you
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Wow
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ladies and gentlemen please give a warm
Husker welcome to the 8th president of
the University of Nebraska System Ted
Carter
well good morning what an exciting day I
am so proud to be standing before you I
am personally on day 45 on the job here
as a University of Nebraska System
president my wife Linda and I got up
this morning they said hey we're red
it's Valentine's Day no it's actually
the eve of the 151st anniversary of the
founding of the University of
nebraska-lincoln congratulations to each
and every one of you that are part of
this
and I want you to know even though I'm
new on the job I've had a chance to get
around the entire state and I've spent
some time here on your campus both main
campus in East Campus and quite honestly
I've been blown away I'm so impressed by
what I've seen the professionalism the
care the dedication to academia to
research to caring for our students
there is not a single institution in our
state of Nebraska that's had a bigger
impact on our history on our past what
is happening today and as we're going to
learn today what will happen in the
future the entire state and the success
of our state goes through not just the
university system but the flagship of
our institutions the University of
nebraska-lincoln
now I'm excited to tell you that we are
going to be writing a strategy for the
entire university system it's going to
be done basically in the next 55 days
and the success of that strategy and how
we enact it how we put it into motion
will be done exactly through the work
that you have done the committees that
worked on the 150th anniversary and the
committee's that will show you today the
work of n 2025 I am so excited for what
you're going to see I applaud everyone
that's had anything to do with that work
and that is the work that will inform us
for how we will go forward now really
the reason I want to come in here today
was to be the person that would
introduce your Chancellor you know I've
gotten to know Ronnie green his wife
Jane here through my entire time going
through my interviews from my vetting
period and I just want you to know how
excited I am to be working with such an
amazing man Ronnie as you all know is
from Roanoke Virginia there's still a
little bit of that Virginia accident in
his voice first-generation to attend
college from a family that was involved
in farming
Virginia Tech grad Colorado State
University Masters Degree in his PhD
right here at University of
nebraska-lincoln he was one of the
leaders in animal science and the entire
country having been published well over
a hundred thirty times and magazines in
papers and symposia he's been here for
many years he was a the leader for the
Institute of Agriculture and Natural
Resources he was the head of academic
affairs here and since May 8th of 2016
he has been your Chancellor ladies and
gentlemen please give a warm welcome to
the 20th Chancellor to the University of
nebraska-lincoln dr. Ronnie green
well thank you very much Ted for that
kind and gracious introduction in to
Linda for joining us this morning as
well you know we were lucky the day they
became Nebraskans and I know with a
promise that is offered through the
unparalleled leadership you're going to
offer is the eighth president of the
University of Nebraska system we're
gonna have a lot of fun together in the
years ahead so welcome to Nebraska wow
what a year we've had in 2019 and I used
the words breathtaking all inspiring in
so many ways to describe that past year
the video that you just saw captured our
wonderful in 150 celebration of our
Nebraska's flagship land-grant
University and it was a celebration of
those who walk before us who walked our
hallowed halls on whose shoulders and
whose minds we actually stand here today
and some might even say that it was a
celebration of 15 decades of true grit
and true glory and profound impact that
this institution has had on Nebraska and
on the world it was also a year where we
both celebrated but also renewed our
trifold land-grant mission of access to
the most exceptional education for the
21st century
to research that will change the world
ahead and to the engagement that we have
with the full citizenry of the state of
Nebraska and now here we are today with
us another scarlet and cream birthday
cake with 151 candles on that cake but
even more renewed and doubled down on
our commitment to our mission we're at
historical highs for providing access to
exceptional education our fall
enrollment of twenty five thousand three
hundred and ninety sets the sixth
straight year that our enrollment has
exceeded twenty five thousand
and not only is our enrollment strong in
numbers but we also have the most
ethnically diverse for entering class in
our history with the have the highest
average AC T in UNL history and we
continue to increase the number of
students who come to us from outside of
Nebraska as well as increased numbers of
Nebraskans in our freshman class now
having students on this campus from 92
and we've got a little work to do on
Arthur County Nebraska by the way 92 of
the 93 counties in the state of Nebraska
every state and territory in the United
States and 131 countries around the
world I'm especially proud that almost
25% of our incoming freshman class this
year are first-generation students and
as you heard President Carter say a
moment ago I understand as many of you
do the challenge that it is to be the
first in a family to pursue a
baccalaureate degree we've initiated
several programs to help give our
first-generation students a step up to
success including first Huskers and
first-generation Nebraskans and as you
know we were also honored this year as
being a part of the inaugural cohort of
first Ford institutions nationally our
commitment to student success is evident
in our record graduation numbers with
this past year graduating a new set a
new record five thousand eight hundred
and sixty eight new Husker alumni making
our total number of graduates now almost
two hundred and ninety six thousand with
two hundred thousand living alumni all
over the world I'm very pleased that UNL
is part of APL use powered by publics
initiative involving a hundred and
thirty institutions around the country
working together in clusters to improve
access and graduation success in our
work as part of the big ten cluster has
a commitment to on our campus reducing
the equity gap in underrepresented
minority students in graduation success
by 50 percent
by 2025 while all the while continuing
to increase access part of the secret of
our success here at UNL is that we
believe in the power of every person we
know that when our University faculty
and staff work one-on-one with students
who may be struggling in one way or
another that we can help those students
to stretch their strengths and define
success in 2019 we began the big red
well resilience and well-being program
that relies heavily on the intensive use
of peer mentors this program helps our
students to develop a set of skills and
behaviors that will give them thoughts
and actions to manage change and perhaps
disappointment if it comes persisting
and growing through adversity enhances
flexibility and overall functioning and
well-being as we all know now we not
only provide a tremendous high value Big
Ten education and we do that by trying
to keep our tuition and fees as low as
possible for our students
but we also graduate and are very proud
of the fact that our students here have
one-third less debt than the national
average we send them out into the
workforce to do big things now I know
I'm guessing a few people watched the
Super Bowl here a few days ago did you
know that one of our graduates Ben buck
not took what he learned in Husker
vision and in the College of Journalism
and mass communications to be one of the
producers for the Kansas City Chiefs in
that game and he's just one of what we
could call literally thousands of
examples of our graduates that go on
into great success in their careers and
civic life we're also setting new
heights in the quantity and the quality
of our research and creative activity we
continued our record-breaking success
this year with 317 million in research
expenditures for you and L which
represents a 26 percent increase in the
past decade in our research activity a
14 percent increase in sponsored
research over the prior year and a 21
percent increase in federal awards over
the prior
that's just simply phenomenal momentum
and more importantly our work has the
power to transform lives the
achievements of our faculty in this
respect are drawing attention nationally
and internationally around the world and
candidly we felt it was important for us
to better tell that story this past year
so we did so by nationally storytelling
in areas like drones applied to multiple
applications digital humanities biology
national defense and feeding a hungry
world sustainably under a changing
climate the last two years in a row were
very proud of the fact that the
University of Nebraska system has been
named in the top 100 institutions
internationally in the number of US
patents filed with 31 filed in 28 2018
22 of which came from UNL and this past
year were on a record-setting pace of 35
that have already been named as
inventors on US patents and while I
don't have the time certainly this
morning to point them all out and name
them individually as you can see on the
screen behind me 2019 was a record year
of national and international
recognition of our world-leading faculty
and staff in honors for the research for
their scholarship through creative
activity their teaching excellence and
in fact in the University of Nebraska
system this year we're very pleased that
we swept the award categories got a brag
a little bit here Ted sorry but we swept
the award categories in the system
Awards across all areas and and I'll
tell you 2020 is looking pretty good too
so we'll leave that one
we'll leave that one alone we also
continue to lead nationally in our
land-grant university mission of
outreach to all of the citizens of our
state
Nebraska Extension is directly engaged
in all 93 counties of our state through
our federal local state partnerships in
those in those areas and you can't look
any further than this past year's
devastating blizzards and floods in our
state that had so much impact and will
have continuing impact in our state to
see the importance that Nebraska
Extension they were there during those
times as they've always been I know
you'll hear that from Dean Hobart here
in a moment to assist Nebraskans now I
just want to share one little simple
statistic with you this morning and let
that sink in to you Nebraska 4-h youth
development program led by Nebraska
Extension in 77 percent of the counties
in Nebraska 50% of age-eligible youth
are a member of 4h in over
three-quarters of the counties in this
state 50% of 9 to 18 year olds are a
member of Nebraska 4-h that's
unprecedented anywhere in the country
and you can only imagine the power that
that has for the future of our state as
well as the outreach the university has
to the people of Nebraska now I know
that you'll hear more highlights of how
we engage with the broader community
from our academic deans here in a few
minutes this morning because this is
occurring not just an extension but in
every corner of UNL across the
institution I would just sum all that up
by saying we are fundamental to the
future of Nebraska and the world now to
me it's somewhat ironic that in an age
where some are questioning the value of
higher education our value has never
been more important or apparent in the
face of challenges our university
creates opportunity with the power to
transform lives across Nebraska and
around the world we deliver an
outstanding education here that provides
students with the lifetime of economic
mobile
and we continued cutting-edge research
that saves lives grows our economy and
improves our quality of life we are
indeed educating the future workforce
here particularly for the state of
Nebraska in education business
engineering agricultural life sciences
in the environment healthcare government
media and communications the arts and
humanities the sciences architecture in
the built environment we are creating
that workforce for the future in all of
those areas I'm happy to tell you this
morning that we're investing in in
significantly expanding programs that
will produce the skilled work workers to
power tomorrow's economy for example
more than 4,000 of our current students
are engaged in high-tech fields or in
STEM related disciplines across our
campus were aligned in an effort
together within a the Omaha and Lincoln
chambers in the Nebraska tech
collaborative and the absorbant
foundation to increase the availability
of workers in these areas with support
from the private sector we announced
plans to build key wood Hall as a part
of our College of Engineering as
expansion to 5,000 students and I want
to particularly thank governor Ricketts
this morning for his support and
advocacy for what's called the high wage
high skill high demands job area for
scholarships that the legislature now
has under consideration a big part of
our engineering investment is now
underway in the development of a school
of computing facilitated with two and a
half million dollars of increased annual
investment into faculty and programs in
the area of computer science and
engineering holy to be housed within the
College of Engineering we expect to
double the number of graduates in
computer science software engineering
and Computer Engineering in the years
ahead to meet the needs of the workforce
for Nebraska
forward in the technology sector and I
would just also add to you this morning
that it's not enough just to think about
preparing our students for specific jobs
because you'd have to be hiding it or a
rock somewhere to not understand that
many of the jobs that our students today
will have haven't even been created or
imagined yet we need our students to
immediately engage with flexible nimble
and strong minds prepared for any
challenge and opportunity that may come
their way through their education now I
know that you're gonna hear from Dean
O'Connor here in a few minutes about the
the establishment and launch of the new
Johnny Carson Center for the emerging
media arts it's a perfect example of
what we're talking about here the
students in the Carson Center will
literally imagine the future and be the
leaders that helped to create it
speaking of leaders I think we are
exceptionally well positioned in 2020 in
having one of the best professional sets
of talent in the higher education sector
here at our University we've had a
number of new faculty join us this past
year we cannot be more excited to have
them in our classrooms and our labs and
our fields and in our studios we've also
welcomed a number of new leaders to our
campus this year led by Vice Chancellor
of the diversity and inclusion marco
barker who is here somewhere who has
come to us and is helping to challenge
us in our perceptions and our thinking
in building a climate that is welcoming
to all deans mark button sherry Jones
and Claire Stewart have already hit the
ground running in their colleges and in
the university libraries you'll be
hearing from them and all of our
academic deans here in a moment I'm very
pleased that dr. sherry Vail incoming
Dean of the College of Journalism and
mass communication will come to us July
1st when she concludes her leadership
duties at the University of Kentucky and
I would like to have you join me in
thanking this morning Amy Struthers for
her two years of service as the interim
dean of the college
journalism and mass communication as
well as Anna shavers who I would have to
say once again stepped up to be the
acting Dean of Nebraska law since June
and I don't I don't have adequate words
this morning to express the gratitude
and the admiration that I have for
Richard Moberly who left his beloved
position and role as the Dean of
Nebraska law to come over to us these
last nine months and provide exceptional
leadership as the interim executive vice
chancellor I'm going to miss Richards
wise counsel his leadership his
pragmatism his ability to unite people
I'm I'm even gonna miss your socks
Richard to be honest with you his humor
and his socks but friend I know where to
find you in the future so thank thank
you Richard for
and I'm very overjoyed this morning to
be able to officially introduce to you
our incoming executive vice chancellor
dr. Elizabeth Spiller who's with us this
morning Elizabeth would you please stand
Elizabeth
as you know Elizabeth would be coming to
us later in March to join us officially
in this role from the University of
California Davis where she's been
serving as the College of the Dean of
the College of Letters and science in
her role there Elizabeth I can't wait to
get you here we're very excited about
having you here I actually can't wait
until your driver's license and your
voter registration as we heard Ted
Carter say last week says you're in
Nebraska so welcome we're very glad to
have you coming to join us I also feel
incredibly fortunate to serve with a
university leadership team that I think
is the best in the business so I would
like to ask all of our vice chancellors
and our cabinet members if you would
please stand and just receive our
gratitude for your leadership I just
really want you to to thank these folks
and and as you know an incredibly
important part of our history and the
values that we have here is the
importance that we place on shared
governance at the University of
nebraska-lincoln where we co-lead the
institution with faculty and
administration and over the past year
our Faculty Senate and our faculty have
been working together with the
university administration to develop
needed changes in our vibe in our bylaws
particularly in regard to our policies
that might address gaps where we might
need to have involuntary leave of
absence for professional staff that's
been hard work it is resulted in a good
result that is now being considered or
going to be considered up through the
university and I would like to thank the
folks that have worked on that in
particular associate vice chancellor for
academic affairs Judy Walker and her
team we hope that we'll have opportunity
for this to go through the approval
process in coming months and be
instituted in the months ahead now I
just want to spend a little bit of time
in this next section talking to you
about how we're growing and building now
there's this thing in Nebraska all of us
that have been here for a long time know
it very well those of us who are joining
us will learn it really well
called the Sandhills grains where they
swarm the state beginning about this
time of year it's a thing of beauty that
we get to observe in Nebraska and I
would wager to you that that's not the
only thing that's going to be swarming
the next few years we have a really
unprecedented level of building growth
on our campus ahead the next three years
where we're going to be investing in
over over five hundred million dollars
in new facilities the next three years
on our campus and these projects while
they're a visual reminder to us they are
a commitment to the excellence in
teaching and learning and research space
for our institution you're aware that
this year we opened at the beginning of
the year the nine million dollar new
home for the Johnny Carson Center for
emerging media arts and
for our dance program in the Hickson
League college will soon be opening just
in a matter of days the new 14 million
France and Alan Francis Allen gymnastics
training facility in Husker athletics as
an addition to the Devaney Center the
Nebraska East Union is just finishing up
the last parts of a twenty nine million
dollar complete renovation of that
facility with parts of it already and
now coming on line a twenty two and a
half million dollar renovation of the CY
Thompson library on East Campus into the
dense Dale family student Learning
Commons is now under way a completely
new 46 million dollar Mabley Hall will
start construction in the next 60 days
to be a new anchor home for the College
of Education and human sciences the
seventy five and a half million dollar
renovation of the engineering link and
Scott Engineering Center in our College
of Engineering is now underway Memorial
mall later this year will begin the
addition of a veteran's tribute that
were very excited about he would haul
our new 85 million largest-ever
corporate partnership and privately
funded and supported project will begin
in 2021 and complete be completed in
2023 as a new instructional home for our
College of Engineering our hundred and
fifty five million dollar go big
football training facility and
student-athlete Success Center we expect
to begin construction later this year
and the new outdoor track and field
facility our Board of Regents just
approved last week moving forward this
spring with the construction of that
facility north of the Devaney Center and
we are continually boosting economic
development impact we're sitting at
Nebraska innovation campus for a reason
this morning I wanted to highlight this
and to talk to you a little bit about
what is happening here we now have a
footprint at ni C of four hundred and
fifty five thousand square feet we have
over 50 partners here on this campus
today a mix of public and private sector
and university entities we have over 750
employees who currently call Nebraska
innovation campus
home generating 324 million dollars in
economic impact and sixteen hundred and
fifty-seven jobs since the inception of
our campus here virtual incisions one of
our partners I see Shane farad are
sitting over here on the side the
founder co-founder of this company
located on innovation campus just
announced a new twenty million dollar
additional round of venture capital
funding and adjuvant another one of our
partners here working in the vaccine
area just received an award from the
National Institutes of Health to improve
the flu vaccine and also just received
an additional twenty million dollars in
venture capital for their company invest
Nebraska and the Nebraska Department of
Economic Development have teamed up to
create the combine incubator here at
Nick that will help us with capacity to
build the pipeline of tech founders in
agriculture in particular around
precision agriculture next month I'm
very excited that we have a date set for
the groundbreaking of a new one hundred
and fifty three room hotel just across
the street from where we sit here this
morning a Marriott affiliated hotel that
will also be the anchor home for our
College of Education in human sciences
hotel restaurant and tourism management
program and I can't tell you they tell
me I can't tell you this is really hard
for me but I can't tell you about the
theme of the hotel but I'll tell you it
has something to do with the University
of Nebraska
and as focused as we've been on
continuously enhancing our research and
creative activity capacity and
infrastructure we were founded as an
institution on access and it cannot be
too important for us to continue to try
to improve and work in the area of
inclusive excellence
that's what access is and I'm very
pleased that over this past year we've
seen major things begin to happen in
that area our first ever diversity
summit last fall led by Vice Chancellor
Barker a number of activities on our
campus and the formation of a council on
inclusive excellence in diversity that
will work across our campus to help
build in this area now I'm going to
wager to you that I think 2020 is a time
that we can say that we are truly rising
and I'm going to try to do it a little
different way this morning you know we
entered the Big Ten now about eight
years ago when we became a member of
this conference and it's been a big deal
for this institution not only the Big
Ten Athletic Conference with the Big Ten
academic alliance as you will know and
it's been a boost to our institution in
athletics in the college athletics
landscape that's constantly changing as
you know we're on solid ground in the
best conference in the United States
very few NCAA Division one institutions
can look at the financial aspects of
athletics and celebrate the success that
we have at Nebraska where our legendary
Husker fans sellout Memorial Stadium the
Devaney Center in Pinnacle Bank Arena on
an ongoing and regular basis were the
envy of every institution in the country
in that regard and it also allows us to
be in the position where Husker
athletics provides ten million dollars
annually to the academic mission of the
University of nebraska-lincoln including
this year a second year of five million
dollars of scholarship support that's
supporting 3,000 of our current students
as Huskers dollars who are non athlete
students as part of our equation here
we're very pleased and thankful for that
our student-athletes to in particular I
want to mention here this morning that's
just an extraordinary thing angela
Mercurio named the 2019 woman of the
year this past year only the second time
in Husker history for us to receive this
national award and just last month anton
stephenson all-american bench gymnast
now a student at UNMC received the 18th
NCAA today's top ten awards considered
the Heisman award for academics in the
NCAA now it's unusual folks for those
two big national honors to go to the big
10 conference it is extraordinary that
they both went to Huskers and I'd like
to ask you to give them a big round
and I should say you know it's it's
really not surprising to see that when
you consider that 338 academic
all-american record that the institution
continues the holds it's just who we are
at Nebraska as mentioned earlier our
faculty are rising in national
prominence and I want to just take I
know we mentioned this earlier but I
just want to point out a few people and
the very prominent awards that they've
received just in recent months this past
year English professor Kwame Das who won
the annual Windham Campbell Prize for
poetry fiction nonfiction literature and
drama one of the premier literary awards
in the world this past year he also won
an Emmy he also was named as a
Chancellor's the American Academy of
poets history professor Margaret Jacobs
named to the very prestigious American
Academy of Arts and Sciences this past
year biomedical engineer Angie pannier
who's sitting here over here on the side
who was named as a presidential early
career award for scientists by the White
House last summer first time ever in our
history received that for her research
on biomaterials and gene delivery
systems Edie Cahoon Tom Clemente and
Eileen habbits named fellows in the
American Association for the Advancement
of science this year and I would just
say to you prior to going into the big
ten our average was one a year our
average is now three a year about
fellows being named a triple is since
entering the Big Ten academic alliance
eight years ago we have seen consistent
increases in our national rankings and
our colleges of business engineering law
and education and Human Sciences our
Institute of Agriculture and Natural
Resources continues to be named amongst
the top 50 programs in the world in this
area and 19 of our graduate programs
across the campus
ranked in the top 25 percent nationally
in areas including this isn't the whole
list but including the areas of history
English physics sociology accountancy
special education and communication
disorders edge
national psychology and agronomy in
horticulture and as I said there are
more on that list the University of
Nebraska Foundation has been a key
partner in helping us to have this rise
in reputation and I can't tell you how
important it is that those private
donors support our investments in
students support our investments in
research and creative activity and
support our our investments in
infrastructure and I just want to thank
them I'd ask you to give them a round of
applause for our continued philanthropic
support and while we're on the rise I
would say that we're also very much
continuing to evolve and I want to talk
to you about two areas in that respect
this morning we're taking steps to
enhance our budget and management of our
budget and stewardship of our resources
now I faced you as you know the last
three years in a very different position
that we're in today the last three years
have been difficult budget years for us
at the University and I want to thank
everyone who has helped to get us in a
better position it's been hard the last
three years but we do have an improved
climate particularly in terms of the
state budget it's much more stable at
this point in time and oh we're very
pleased about that but we also know that
even though we're on that positive
footing and it's better than the past
three years has been that we have needs
to address our budget model as you've
heard us talk a lot about these past two
years and we've begun on that journey of
moving to an incentive-based budget
model and you feel remember a year ago
at this address
I said that I considered this to be the
biggest short-term priority for the
University of nebraska-lincoln because
we wanted to enable and empower the kind
of growth strategically that we want and
that we call for in the strategic plan
we're going to talk about here in a
moment now we've come a long way on the
journey of the development of this
budget model and I want to thank
everyone who has worked on it in
particular bill Nunez our vice
chancellor of Business and Finance and
Kathy Ferro our Dean of the College of
Business
who have co-chaired the steering
committee in working to develop this new
model over the last couple of years
we've largely defined the model to this
point a great deal of work has gone into
that and socializing that with our
Dean's and with our Vice Chancellors to
understand how it will begin to change
our planning and our framework for our
budget now I want to clear a couple of
things up you know we've we've used the
term shadow year for the year that we're
in in our budget development process and
perhaps it's been a little confusing to
some I want to make sure we're clear
this morning there is no magic switch
that will happen on July 1st of this
year when we move into the new fiscal
year nor is there any fiscal cliff that
will imperil any of our units in the
future what really kicks in this next
year is in our planning utilizing the
budget model to form our budget for
moving forward throughout this next
fiscal year will model revenues and plan
budgets in a new way one that allows us
to reward growth reinvest in our future
and ensure the success of the common
good
I have no idea what's up there every
year they got to do something folks so
but even as the effects of the new
budget take hold in July of 2021 there's
still no magic switch or fiscal cliff
there will be I'll emphasize this there
must be an iterative process in this
implementation of our new budget model
it'll be two to three years before the
fall effects of the budget model are in
place and I can tell you that I cannot
wait to see the imaginative prospects
for what it does to allow us to
strategically invest in the university
moving forward what I ask each of you is
to engage if you have questions ask them
we've had a lot of dialogue about this
this past year and I want you to engage
realize that we're in this all together
that it's a collaborative effort and
that if we work in that way it will be
for the good of the university long term
I'm sure we'll be stronger for it and as
we get our budget model up and running
I'm most excited for how it will develop
as I said our ability to advance our
strategic priorities for the university
as a whole now you might remember last
year last year was a little different we
were getting ready to celebrate our
150th anniversary we talked a lot about
our history and what led to that but I
said that I hoped that our leaders in
the future would look back and say that
we're boldly imagining I would also
follow that by saying it's not enough
just to boldly imagine you have to you
have to do something to make that happen
yeah as well and I'm immensely pleased
this morning that today we were taking
actions to be boldly strategic you'll
remember a year ago we talked about the
N 150 Commission and the report of that
commission around a big 25 year vision
for our university and it's worth
reiterating here what was said in that
kind of the big statement was that we
hoped UNL would be unparalleled among
public research universities and access
and opportunity and innovation and in
lifelong experiential learning through
the intensive work of the N 150
Commission they laid out that
imaginative 25 year journey and I would
say it's a significant journey that lies
ahead of us you can't begin a big
journey without taking first steps so
earlier this past year we asked a group
of 30 leaders from across the university
making ups faculty staff students and
administration to take on the leadership
of the development of a first five-year
plan in a aspiring to that vision I
asked them to think boldly and to lay
out concrete steps to get us down the
path of the first five years of the N
150 to the year 2025 I couldn't be
prouder of the accomplishments of this
group or more appreciative of their
efforts I'd like to ask the entire in
2025 development team if you would
please stand if you're in the audience
on to a number of you were here this
morning please stand
and let us thank you for your work now
you for keep standing up you for in
particular we will forever be indebted
to these for our faculty co-chairs who
led this effort
Rick Bevins Susan Sherrod and Angela
paneer and Shane Farah der they are
amazing leaders I wanted this to be
faculty led to be led by our
distinguished professors and we thank
you so much for what you've done you you
actually pushed us even harder than I
thought that you might you had an
incredibly collaborative effort across
our campus and even told me a time or
two that we probably were going too far
so I really appreciate your your effort
now I'm very pleased today that we've
crossed the finish line if you will and
we are now releasing today for the first
time our in 2025 plan now I think you
will receive this and they give your
printed copies that you can receive on
the way off the door of the 2025 plan
and its efforts this again is important
four steps for us you know it's
difficult for us to be the University in
2040 for that 25-year vision if we don't
take these first steps I will tell you
that I think this plan gets it right it
hits the right notes it focuses on the
right aims it will stretch us in
meaningful and significant ways the
overarching theme for the plan every
person and every interaction matters is
one of the core aspirations from the N
150 Commission report it speaks clearly
and loudly to the aims the strategies
and the targets of the plan and it
resonates so personally with who we are
at Nebraska where we believe in the
power of every person we believe we
offer opportunities for one-to-one
engagement that will propel the success
of our students and of our research and
the impact of our engagement staying
true to this idea
therefore it being a prince
whole piece of the plan empowers us to
do the big things called for in this
strategic plan the next five years the
end 2025 plan has six strategic aims for
our campus that deal with student
success and learning deals with creative
activity and scholarship deals with
engagement deals with a diversity and
inclusive excellence and deals with
investing in our people here at the
University and I'll give you just a
snapshot of these six aims if you will
along with the targets that have been
set in this strategic plan
moving forward the first name calls us
to innovate student experience that
prepare graduates to be lifelong
learners and contributors to the
workforce of Nebraska in the world in
this particular aim you'll see that we
seek to increase our four-year
graduation rate to 55 percent and our
six-year graduation rate to 72 percent
but more importantly folks I would say
focusing on retention and increasing our
first to second year student retention
rate to 88 percent and our total
enrollment collectively to 15 percent
perhaps the most audacious goal and I'm
going to point to this specifically
because I think it's the biggest one in
the whole document is the last one here
where we're focused on an experiential
learning portfolio for our students we
do some of this today we don't do it
across the board nor do we track it
effectively and to put this in
perspective folks next fall 2021 is the
entering class of 2025 five years from
now and this old cost for us to have an
experiential portfolio in those students
that includes intern internships and
apprenticeships an international
engagement in community problem-solving
and research experience that is a big
goal and I can't underline it enough
under the second and third aims we will
establish a culture at Nebraska
committed to increasing the impact of
research and creative activity and
focusing our research we are scholarship
and creative activity in
interdisciplinary ways and solving
challenges critical to Nebraska
in the world we want to reach 450
million in research experience
expenditures you saw the number earlier
of where we are today and increase the
prestige awarded to our faculty we want
to broaden the interdisciplinary
research and increase our intellectual
property and transfer of that
intellectual property into the public we
also want to prioritize 50% of our
investments strategically into what we
will call Grand Challenge areas like
this is not all-inclusive but like areas
of early childhood development in
education or feeding a hungry world
under a sustainable climate or you know
a resiliency in a changing climate our
next step in 2020 is to immediately
identify what this suite of Grand
Challenges will be for us over the
number of years ahead
our fourth aim asks us to broaden
Nebraska's engagement in community
industry and global partnerships this
aim has only three targets it looks
short
but the one of those is a quite big one
the dean designated as a carnegie
community engagement campus that has a
whole tremendous number of metrics
associated with it I will tell you that
this is a lofty goal and success will
require a concerted effort on the part
of all of us now we just celebrated one
hundred and fiftieth anniversary as a
committed peoples university to all of
the people of this state whether it's
the rural areas the urban areas across
our entire state of Nebraska I will tell
you that if there is an institution that
should be designated this we should
aspire to be it's the University of
nebraska-lincoln and will enhance our
commitment to the people of the great
state of Nebraska in the 15 we reiterate
our commitment to create a climate at
Nebraska that emphasizes prioritizes and
expands inclusive excellence and
diversity folks we will not be
successful if we don't do this we will
not be successful if we don't reduce
barriers increase diversity and boost
the six
for all of our students faculty and
staff this aim provides specific goals
for us in increasing the participation
and success of underrepresented groups
across our university we will never be
an unparalleled university without
amazing people and investment in them
I'm inspired every day by the work of
our over 6300 faculty and staff here at
UNL but we must prioritize participation
in professional development for all
Nebraska students staff and faculty the
targets in this aim speak directly to
this and will require us to act across
the board in ways that we don't
currently for example the need to
develop the processes and needed
documentation for individualized
professional development plans for all
of our employees and professionals
across the institution and we will begin
our work toward inclusion of staff into
the university's governance framework
along with our faculty and our students
as a public university we must always be
good stewards of the resources that are
committed to us the new budget model we
were just speaking about will help us
through incentivizing efficiencies in
prioritizing the investment of resources
to align with our strategic priorities
and we must folks continue to find ways
to be more energy efficient and
sustainable across our campus and in our
university operations including I would
say reduction of administrative overhead
you are likely asking yourselves now
this all sounds great
but how are we going to get it done and
what's the implementation steps that we
have to move forward in the coming weeks
we will be assigning leaders that will
be accountable for each of these targets
while they will not achieve them alone
it's going to require all of us to work
together there'll be the accountable
party that will be working to help the
organization achieve these aims and
targets and marshal the efforts that
will be needed for us to achieve them
moving forward we will regularly
communicate to you across the campus
about the end 2025
and our progress on these goals and I
will I will say to you look a five-year
plan I expect us every year to
re-evaluate whether our aims and targets
are adequate whether we need to adjust
them up or down in terms of the time
that we move forward and I'm confident
folks that if we can achieve these six
aims and hit our targets we will be well
on our way to realizing that imaginative
future laid out in the end 150
Commission report a year ago our
students will be prepared to boldly and
nimbly step into the future into
successful careers our research will
have an even greater impact in stature
nationally and internationally and we
will have done far more to achieve our
land-grant mission for the people of the
state of Nebraska now if I was to wrap
all of that together I will tell you
that I think we sit at a really
interesting and promising inflection
point at this point in time in our
history we have incredible people were
rising as we talked about and growing
earlier we have momentum that continues
to build and I think we're poised for an
incredible future that lies ahead I
think this plan gives us the platform to
move that forward at an even elevated
level and now simply folks it's time to
get off on to the races and to let it go
to get it done so I'm very pleased about
that now I have a special treat for you
this morning in two pieces one is we've
got a new format this year you're going
to hear from our academic deans here in
a few moments to tell you a little bit
about how they see the state of their
College and we look forward to them
doing that in between I had the
privilege Jane and I had the privilege
of hearing the next group of students
that you're going to hear from now a
group of our cusp scholars from Rwanda
that have a special musical piece for
you I hope you will enjoy it we'll come
back afterwards have a little bit of
dialogue after year from the deans thank
you
I think friendship with inference to be
something buddy all over the word but I
don't wear
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Applause]
good morning thanks for everyone for
being here thank you Chancellor green
for such an inspirational message it's
really been a pleasure to work with you
so I'd now like to spend just a few
minutes giving an update on the College
of Engineering so the University of
nebraska-lincoln began teaching
engineering in 1877 just eight years
after its founding and last year while
UNL was celebrating its 150th
anniversary the College of Engineering
was celebrating its 110th anniversary as
a college in our time as a College of
Engineering we have educated over 30,000
construction engineering and computing
professionals who have gone on to
successful careers and being leaders in
their communities and their profession
as we reflected on our 110 hit a 110
year history we are also making
significant progress on our goals to
become a major source of economic
development in the state and the region
while solving problems of global
importance this of course begins with
our faculty next slide please
thank you I when we joined the Big Ten
we joined without question the single
best collection of colleges of
engineering in the world and we are now
successfully competing with those
colleges across our educational research
and engagement activities we've hired 43
new faculty in the last three years our
faculty have won five national science
foundation career Awards in the last
five years by far the most competitive
award our young engineering faculty
member can get our faculty are
conducting world-leading research and
biomedical areas developing new surgical
techniques technologies that will save
the lives of civilians and soldiers who
have traumatic pulmonary injuries
transforming agriculture they are
looking at ways of 3d printing metals
that will transform the manufacturing
industry and allows screws that are put
in during orthopedic surgery to be
absorbed by the body
this research enterprise
is going to positively impact the life
of every Nebraskan next slide please
we're very proud of of our complete
engineer program this program developed
six non-technical competencies and our
students that is giving our graduates a
competitive advantage when they enter
the workforce it is generating allowing
the young women who leave the college to
become leaders in the engineering
computing and construction fields in a
way that is allowing that is giving them
a competitive advantage and allowing
engineering to move forward in a
sustainable way over half of our
graduates stay in the state of Nebraska
we have 11,000 students that are
currently a graduates that are currently
working in Nebraska there are leaders in
industry with companies like Olson HDR
kiewit company and the Leo Daley last
slide please thank you as I have run out
of time you've heard a lot the the
shepherd's crook is about to come out we
you've heard a lot about key wood Hall
this building is going to transform the
educational experience for our students
it's also going to give the 5,000
students who live in able in Sandoz hall
a new academic quad we're really
grateful for the support of the Nebraska
philanthropic community for making this
happen particularly Peter Kiewit and
Sons who gave a naming gift and the able
family who've donated land to make this
happen none of this would happen without
the great faculty staff and students in
the College of Engineering and without
the support of the university leadership
including the chancellor's office and
the president's office thank you very
much
[Applause]
[Music]
so the mission next slide please
the mission of the agricultural research
division is to support the science to
ensure resilient food systems and a
healthy global future and our faculty
continue to build transdisciplinary
teams across the University of Nebraska
system and beyond to address a breadth
of Grand Challenges within that mission
framework and there are many metrics
that reflect their success the primary
measure is sponsored research
expenditures and that number has
remained at an all-time high for these
faculty in the past year of over fifty
four million dollars and has increased
25% in the last five years there are
also many many examples of programmatic
successes and impacts so I could
highlight a lot of things but what I've
chosen to do on this slide is to
recognize a major accomplishment by some
of our most junior faculty the National
Science Foundation Career Award is one
of the most prestigious research awards
for junior faculty you and UNL was very
honored in the past year to have five
awardees and for those have ARD
appointments rebecca austin studying
mechanisms of toll of sorry of cold
tolerance implants joe lewis studying
plant insect interactions toshi ibadah
studying fundamental responses to biotic
stresses like drought and important
crops like corn and Rebecca walks
exploring alternative treatments for
pain using biomaterials so I appreciate
the chance to just say thank you to all
of our faculty for their hard work and
dedication
good morning everybody I'm Chuck Hubbard
Dean and director of Nebraska Extension
I'm from Lexington Nebraska and I'm a
graduate of this amazing educational
institution I'm just really really proud
of that and on top of that I get to work
here now it just doesn't get much better
right so we wanted to tell you just a
little bit about Nebraska Extension you
may know about our mission to serve all
93 counties of the state of Nebraska in
a network that really does connect
people with this University
we've been organized in five extension
districts for about the last ten years
or so and one of the things that we
wanted to do was to really double down
on our connection with our employees our
stakeholders and Nebraskans and so what
we've done is to reorganize into 11 what
we call engagement zones ok and so we're
in the process we've hired nine of our
11 engagement zone coordinators you can
see their photos on the lower right of
the screen what we really want to be
able to accomplish with these people in
their work a distributed leadership
model across the state number one really
focused on employee success you may not
know that half of extension field-based
faculty in Nebraska have been on the job
for less than five years this is a youth
movement that's bringing incredible
talent into our organization we want to
take care of those folks and give them
an opportunity to be successful the
second role is to really amp up our work
in stakeholder relationships with
partners with county government with our
Extension boards and others and really
do that better and more effectively and
then third to follow up on Ronnie's
announcement today about the University
of nebraska-lincoln engagement
commitment to engagement
these folks are being asked to connect
with leaders in their communities people
involved in government and organizations
libraries educational institutions etc
build those relationships and ask lots
of powerful questions so that we can
better understand what the needs and
opportunities are that Nebraskans seek
this is so important to our engagement
mission because I've always believed
that we should
go into a community and do it to them we
should go into a community ask lots of
questions
build the relationships and do it with
them
that's what engagement is all about
thank you very much
well good morning my name is Tiffany
Heng moss and I have the honor of
serving as dean for the College of
Agricultural Sciences and Natural
Resources it's an exciting time for our
College and the Institute of Ag and
natural resources we have a number of
strategic priorities under way including
transforming graduate education a
holistic focus on student development by
linking curricular programming with
experiential learning co-curricular
opportunities student health and
well-being and inclusive excellence
we're also partnering with Nebraska
Extension to serve the continuum of
learners in our state so the creation of
the northeast Nebraska agriculture and
natural resources education compact is
an example of our focus on the continuum
of learners this is the first education
compact for the state of Nebraska so
it's a really big deal the compact
combines the strengths of the partnering
institutions to serve the diverse
educational needs of our youth and
lifelong learners and also contribute to
talent and workforce development in the
northeast part of the state as you can
see we have a number of partners on this
program first we have little priests
tribal College we have Nebraska College
of technical agriculture the Nebraska
Indian Community College Northeast
Community College Wayne Community
Schools Wayne State College Nebraska
extension and Kasner this program
supports both state and local and
national initiatives to increase improve
college and career readiness educational
attainment and community and economic
vitality and growth
it also supports our end 2025 plan for
our University and the University and
luminous goals to improve the number of
students that have post-secondary
credentials by the year 2025 so what
we're looking at is going from 45.8% as
a national average
to 60% so we signed this agreement in
October and I just want to share a
couple of key partnerships that have
been developed so far so we've signed a
partnership agreement with Wayne State
College to offer the first dueled
program between non institution and
Kasner we've developed an articulation
pathway from associate to baccalaureate
degree with Nebraska Indian Community
College the first baccalaureate pathway
that this institution has in its history
and then finally we're working with
North East Community College to
strengthen our partnership programs and
develop a reverse transfer model so
again we're really excited to grow our
partnership programs in the northeast
part of the state as we'll expand the
model to other parts of Nebraska and
last but not least I want to thank the
amazing faculty staff and students in
the College of Agricultural Sciences and
all that you do for Nebraska and our
global society thank you good morning
I'm Kathy Anderson and I'm Dean of the
College of Architecture in the College
of Architecture we prepare emerging
professionals architects designers and
planners who positively impact
communities parks plazas building spaces
that each of you are affected by every
minute of every day our students learn
to think critically creatively and
holistically and are in demand not only
by our professions but by allied fields
as well and this is demonstrated by our
five-year average placement rate of 96%
next oh you're good oh this this fall we
welcomed 140 people for dinner
to celebrate the 50th anniversary of our
London study abroad program it was an
amazing experience the buzz and
excitement in the room was was
tremendous and it made all of us
realized the life-changing experiences
of study abroad and the importance of
them in 2019 we gathered over 50 stake
holders who dug deep had invigorating
discussions and developed a strategic
plan that will guide us through the next
five years we make an impact on the
state of Nebraska through avenues of
service learning and through our
research
I'm proud to highlight ongoing community
service impact projects led by college
of architecture faculty you can see some
of them here from 2019 from design-build
projects to helping the flood ravaged
village of Winslow Sea alternatives for
the potential of moving their community
and many more our Faculty's research
impacts the state and its residents as
they explore autonomous shuttles bicycle
infrastructure water and wetlands
management quality of life for
minorities and rural communities our
faculty and staff are exceptional and
caring professionals and our faculty are
recognized and widely acclaimed for with
research and design awards publications
presentations and recognized at the
highest levels of their disciplines as
you can see here our students compete
against the best in the world and they
succeed here you see a few examples of
some of those accolades from 2019 for
instance the Sarah which is the Society
of American registered architects our
students garnered the top prizes at the
national level for the third year in a
row and for the New York chapter for the
fifth consecutive year our students win
Student design competitions such as the
international here and now a house for
the 21st century
the national steel design student
competition those are just a few of the
accomplishments of our students they're
presenting at national conferences and
exhibits winning state and regional
design awards we have much to celebrate
from 2019 and much to look forward to in
2020 as we implement our strategies and
as we have a transformed library and
studio space in our building thank you
good afternoon for the past seven months
it's been my honor to serve as the Dean
of the College of Arts and Sciences our
vision is to be a world leading College
of Arts and Sciences where diverse
disciplines and the humanities the
scientists and the social sciences are
united by a shared commitment to
collaborate in the discovery of new
knowledge into advance interdisciplinary
solutions to challenges that are
critical to Nebraska and to the world
2019 was a year of many amazing
successes for our students and our
faculty it starts first with a
record-breaking number of students on
the Dean's List 1407 students of high
achievement by our students our
aspiration is that every student will
have a transformative experience while
they're on our campus whether that's in
a lab in the field through an internship
or a study abroad opportunity here are
just some additional examples of student
achievements undergraduate and graduate
students participated on the torus
project which is one of the most
ambitious drone based studies of severe
weather ever conducted our Speech and
Debate team directed by Erin Duncan
celebrated their eighth Big Ten
championship this past year and students
like Lamar Oh Lamar are making the most
of their experiences at Nebraska he
balances the roles of naval ROTC
Midshipmen member of the Nebraska cheer
squad recording artist and full-time
political science student the College of
Arts and Sciences of course home into an
amazing group of faculty and staff in
under three minutes
it's perilous to only mention a few of
them but here you go
historian dr. Margaret Jacobs was named
to the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences dr. mark Walker became
Nebraska's tenth American Mathematical
Society Fellow
and biologist dr. Eileen Habits was
selected as a fellow of the American
Association of Academy of Sciences you
heard Chancellor green reference and
speak to the accomplishments of
Chancellor professor Kwame das an
English professor
Chico's EOB OMA became one of the only a
handful of authors to appear on a Booker
Prize short list with back-to-back
novels in this past year the
interdisciplinary rural drug addiction
Research Center was launched led by Kirk
Dombrowski through eleven point eight
million NIH grant to address drug
addiction in the rural Midwest the
college is also home to national leaders
who are improving the teaching and
learning of mathematics and STEM fields
through programs like stem connect and
the college is also home to cutting-edge
research and nanoscience and
nanotechnology the college is also home
to national leaders in digitizing
humanities and culture with a host of
digital humanities projects and
interdisciplinary film productions
looking ahead to 2020 and beyond the
college has some key priorities in
collaboration with unmc the college will
be a key player in the contributing to
big ideas like the Nebraska drug
delivery development pipeline a joint
biomedical research effort that will
establish a national resource for new
drug discovery and development the
college is going to be a national leader
in experiential learning and in
workforce development through a new
focus on internships and career
readiness and the College of Arts and
Sciences intends to be a key partner in
ending the graduation achievement gap
for underrepresented first-generation
and low-income students increasing
access and educational attainment and
transforming lives thank you
[Music]
hello I'm Kathy Farrell and I'm the Dean
of the College of Business so I'm going
to share a few highlights from the
college first two years ago when I
became the Dean we launched a strategic
planning process that engaged
stakeholders from across campus in the
college and business partners and alums
through that we rolled out our strategic
plan about 18 months ago and revisited
our mission statement our new mission
statement is together we drive discovery
create opportunities and empower
individuals to lead the future of
business based on that mission we also
developed and revised guiding principles
these guiding principles begin with a
focus on the self and then move to a
focus on the greater good they start
with challenging yourself be inclusive
ask bold questions look to the future
and make it matter it's so based on
these this strategic vision as well as
these guiding principles we set out to
start executing on our strategic plan we
began by building on our strengths we
have consistently had an extremely
strong undergraduate business program
that I would remiss be remiss to not
mention that we've been ranked in the
top 50 for over four years of business
programs colleges of business in the big
ten are some of the best public business
schools in the country and we didn't
want to be just big ten ten in name we
want to be big ten in fact so we're
building on our existing strengths which
include our undergraduate programs in
addition to that at the graduate level
we have a highly renowned online MBA
program it is currently ranked 9th in
poets and quants and 14th and I think
22nd in US News and World Report I like
poet and quants the best but anyway so
we have highly ranked online MBA
programs and I and specifically we are
very strong in the online space and we
plan to continue to leverage that so
what have we accomplished in the last 18
months we have built out our online
graduate programs we launched two new
specialized masters a master's in
finance and a master's in business
analytics as well as certificate
programs the certificate in human
resources as well as a joint program
with the College of Journalism and mass
communications and business
communications so we're continuing to
leverage that strength
we also are leveraging our undergraduate
position with a joint program with the
College of Law we just launched last
year a law and business minor that we
plan to grow to a major that's very
interdisciplinary in nature we are
leveraging our Clifton strengths
Institute last summer we trained over 30
faculty and staff as advanced certified
strengths coaches and that brought our
total up to over 40 strengths coaches
among faculty and staff and we have 80
strengths coaches that are
undergraduates that mentor our peers we
are also one of the colleges that works
with the alumni is working with the
Alumni Association to launch the Husker
connect which is a platform for
mentoring alums and undergraduate
students so engagement is an extremely
important part of our overall goals we
also following the lead of the College
of Journalism and mass communication we
offered our first pop-up class and we're
continuing to expand in that space as
well as what we call business plus
workshops which are skill based
workshops that give our students the
ability to learn skills that will help
make them more marketable in the
workforce but aren't necessarily
undergraduate curriculum type skills so
at the undergraduate and graduate level
those are some of our accomplishments we
couldn't do any of this without the help
of our faculty staff and quite frankly
the commitment of our students so what's
coming what's kit what we're continuing
to build out is our online graduate
programs we have multiple specialized
master's degrees that we're getting
ready to launch certificate programs as
well as accelerated master's programs
for our current undergraduate students
we're also leveraging and creating
additional programs of excellence as I
mentioned the business and law minor
moving to a major but also
programs in that area of other programs
as well in terms of engagement and
connection we're looking at continuing
to leverage our relationships with our
corporate partners both from in terms of
research support but also in terms of
placement of our students expanding
internship opportunities and experience
alerting key component of our strategic
plan is transformational and
experiential learning in the engagement
space we're also looking at talent
acquisition programs so all of this is
yet to come
but we're we're very excited about the
energy that our strategic plan has
created and the commitment of our
faculty staff and students and quite
frankly the broader alumni community I
would be remiss to not say that we are
operating in the currently the most an
84 million dollar facility that was
privately funded and I just wanted to
point out that engineering is 85 so
we're building a two million dollar
expansion is privately fun just kidding
okay
good afternoon my name is sherry Jones
Dean of the College of Education and
Human Sciences it has been an absolute
pleasure to move into this position this
past year to lead a college whose work
impacts the human condition throughout
the lifespan and I will just say to my
college they know I'm very mindful of my
allotted time so I will not be able to
cover all of our accomplishments but I
will say on time
so Ronnie mentioned rankings I do want
to say that our College is currently the
highest ranked College on campus and US
News and World Report we are number 39
for graduate colleges of education and
we are making a plan to move to the top
we celebrated 15 years this last year of
impactful research on learning and
development through the Nebraska Center
for research on children youth families
in schools we celebrated a phase to 11
million dollar Cobre grant to continue
our work on prevention of obesity
related diseases in teaching we launched
the teacher scholars Academy and
partnership with un o and UN K this is a
scholarship program at UNL our students
are in a living and learning community
leadership curriculum experiential
learning in Nebraska schools and it's my
hope that our graduates will fill
Nebraska schools with teacher leaders
through our partnership with Nebraska
Extension and 4-h we delivered
age-appropriate activities to teach
young children in elementary school
about healthy eating and the importance
of physical activity so just a few
examples of our impactful work this past
year so what's next for the college we
are expanding our footprint to a
building near you and you heard Roni
talk about a few of these our
construction new construction
reconstruction expansion and renovation
will place us on City campus East Campus
and innovation campus so we'll be where
the action is
these buildings will also enable us to
enhance experiential learning promote
and support growth in scholarship and
interdisciplinary work and prepare a
workforce for tomorrow's communities and
enhance our community engagement
innovative ways but it's not just about
what happens in the buildings are on the
campus footprint the college has been
discussing our collective genius and you
can move to the next slide and what
grand visions that we might accomplish
for Nebraska and beyond and some
examples of what we've been discussing
every young child in Nebraska will
thrive by five and be great by eight all
inhabitants of Nebraska will have access
to health and wellness services that are
well integrated into their communities
and Nebraska communities will have
strong schools filled with strong
leaders and high quality teachers and at
the center of all of these Grand
Challenges is our mission to enhance the
lives of individuals families schools
and communities and strengthen the
relationships among them so if we can
partner with you to make these grand
visions happen please come and see us
thank you
good morning everyone my name is Chuck
O'Connor I'm the Dean of the Hickson
League College of Fine and Performing
Arts and although I'm here this morning
to talk about some of the highlights of
our college over the past year and some
of our goals of course I would be remiss
and not mentioning the many achievements
of our faculty and staff and students
every year and in all ways over 100 over
1,000 screenings performances exhibits
and public lectures around the world
every year so I'm very very grateful for
them in our College the Hickson League
College of Fine and Performing Arts and
everything that we do we seek to create
a new social vision that that includes
all of us and we seek partnerships
across campus that creatively fused the
Arts with design and media and
technology as well as with many of the
cultural traditions that have come down
to us through the millennia and those
perspectives that have been marginalized
historically let me give you a few
examples of how we do that this year we
opened the Johnny Carson Center for
emerging media arts made possible by a
20 million dollar gift from the Johnny
Carson foundation it sits in the old
Nebraska bookstore that many of you
remember when it was painted when it was
brick colored now it's kind of dark grey
and this Center is just amazing and it
incentivizes really interdisciplinary
approaches to to storytelling across a
continuum from live performance to
virtual reality and augmented reality
and cinema and the implications of
artificial intelligence on storytelling
likewise there were ghosts
students in the center or really become
well-versed not only systems in critical
thinking but coding and entrepreneurship
as well and they're central to the work
force of our state it's supported by an
advisory board for major IT social media
companies across the country as well as
nonprofits and government entities in
addition to the Karstens center of the
Nebraska
pretory theater performs in the lead
center as our state's professional
theater company and professional theater
training program and like the Carson
Center it engages in some of our most
important challenges in our society
today finally this year in partnership
with many people and many other
institutions across this campus we
launched we are Nebraska this
student-led improvised improvisational
company tells the story of our campus
through the eyes of its students
these students are international and
national conservative and liberal rural
and urban all races straight gay
transgender all stories told about our
campus and what it's like to be a
student on our campus in these times and
the values that we share together we
perform across campus as well as in the
community on First Fridays and one of
our major really attenders of our of we
are Nebraska or the Lincoln is the
Lincoln Police Department many of the
members of whom express how important it
is to their work as police officers to
empathize and understand the people that
they're serving our next production will
be this afternoon a little bit of a plug
here at 3:30 at Hawks Hall in the
College of Business a partner of ours we
will really invite you all to attend
thank you very very much
good morning everyone I'm Rick Holloway
I'm representing the College of
Journalism and mass communications today
and as the university celebrated its
150th anniversary last year our own
College was celebrating 125 years and
that was a kind of an interesting
milestone for us because it was back in
1894 that will Owen Jones the editor of
the Nebraska State Journal stepped into
the classroom for the first time to
teach students about the importance of
the First Amendment and freedom of the
press and among his students was a very
interested young student and future
writer named Willa Cather so we're
excited to have had her in our program
2019 also marked the 10th anniversary of
Yad our student-run advertising agency
the agency provides students with
innovative opportunities to gain
real-world experience by working with
real clients other major milestones in
2019 the fifth anniversary of the
MobileMe nu conference which is our
annual conference that brings together
students and academics and leading
industry professionals to examine the
latest trends and best practices in
mobile media we saw a growth in both our
undergraduate and graduate programs in
2019 including partnerships with the
College of Business as you heard we
obtained final approval of a graduate
certificate in financial communications
we expanded the pop-up classes as you
heard we offered 22 of them last year
and these one-hour classes gave all
folks across the campus an opportunity
to dive into emerging industry trends we
launched a core curriculum across all
four of our majors that provide students
with a solid foundation in writing and
visual communications and law and ethics
we established a new media production
option for undergraduate students to
focus on using digital platforms and
contemporary media to tell journalistic
stories we introduced a new capstone
experience for journalism and
broadcasting students the news lab which
incorporates our Nebraska news service
providing legislative and state
government news to 120 media outlets
across the state we launched the Roper
sports reporter in residence program
which connects students and our new and
rapidly growing sports media
communication major to professionals
working in the field and we continue to
do some more
winning work in our College our students
took home sixth place nationally in the
Hearst intercollegiate journalism awards
in first place in the public relations
student Society of America national
organ donor awareness competition for a
hundred and twenty five years our
faculty have worked to instill the First
Amendment values in our students and our
communities in our state in 2020 we're
excited to welcome our new dean to the
College as you heard dr. sherri vale who
will join us in mid-summer and we look
forward to working with her to chart the
next 125 years thank you good morning
I'm Richard Moberly and I'm the soon to
be back as Dean at the College of Law
I'd like to use our mission statement
for phrases from our mission statement
to give you a few quick snapshots of the
College of Law this year and we wrote
this mission statement as a community
this year and we think it describes us
on our best days but actually inspires
us for what we're going to become in the
future the first phrase is that we
develop inclusive leaders and and that's
really important for us because lawyers
people with law degrees we know lead
their clients every day through some of
the most difficult times in their lives
but they also lead corporations and
businesses and governments nonprofit
entities universities their leaders in
their communities and when we think
about leaders at the law school today we
want people to be inclusive leaders to
bring everyone to the table so we can
hear a lot of different perspectives and
when I think about a great example of an
inclusive leader I know she's been
mentioned today but I'm going to call
her out again and that's acting Dean and
a shaper she's in the back if you could
please wave
[Music]
just if you know her you know what a
tremendous individual she is she's also
an amazing leader she's led to college
this last year on a college wide
discussion on many different
perspectives on immigration she has led
our faculty on discussions of inclusive
pedagogy she won the Chancellor's
fulfilling the dream award thank you for
your service this year and throughout
your career Dean shavers we really
appreciate you we have it we have a next
generation of leaders that are coming we
have pipeline programs at four colleges
and universities across the state and
they're students who are from rural
areas or they're bilingual or they're
first generation and they want to come
to law school and after law school and
they're gonna come to Nebraska law and
after they're done they're gonna go back
out to greater Nebraska and solve a real
need for lawyers and many of our
communities and also work in the public
interest so I'm proud that we're gonna
welcome 55 of them over the next few
years coming to the College of Law we're
at our best when we advance justice at
the College of Law the woman on your
left is Professor Jessica shoemaker
spent the last year as a Fulbright
Scholar in Canada study on working on
indigenous populations rights she's
bringing that scholarship back to
Nebraska and she's working with Native
American communities to use property law
to address poverty issues on
reservations we also have a partnership
with the center for children families in
the law led by Professor Michele Paxton
who is literally changing the way
children are being represented in
Lancaster County for the better and
across the state of Nebraska and we're
very proud of the work that she and our
students are doing when we think about
solving vital societal problems I have
my band member up there on the left is
Gus Hurwitz he's got a backup band
that's coming soon I think with that
picture but I love but last Friday the
Board of Regents passed the center for
the Nebraska governance and Technology
Center which with our partners at the
College of Business and College of
Engineering I was going to transform the
way we think about innovative
technologies and their impact on society
professor Jack beard is leading an
international cohort to literally write
the rules
for military engagement in space and if
you don't think that's important then
take out your phone and think what would
we do without satellites and he and this
we're one of four institutions across
the globe that are working on that
projects going to make a huge impact in
the world in the future and then I think
about our students who serve with
integrity and our students perform
thousands of hours every year of free
legal work for people in need in fact
the American Bar Association recently
awarded us for the second year in a row
the only law school to receive pro bono
award and I'm incredibly proud of
professor Ryan Sullivan and the work
that all those students do to really
provide legal services for people who
need it so those are four quick
snapshots of the types of things we're
trying to do in our mission I'll leave
you since everyone else talked about
metrics I'll leave you with a couple of
numbers to think about there's 200 law
schools in the country one of the most
important things for our students when
they graduate stup ass the bar exam to
be able to come lawyers over the last
two years our students have had the 11th
highest bar exam passage rate in the
country 1 ahead of what I call the
Nebraska of the East Harvard Law School
and so I'm really proud of what they're
doing they get jobs at a rate that's the
sixth highest in the country and guess
what gang they do it all for the 4th
lowest debt load when they leave it's a
tremendous ability for them to just
creates all sorts of opportunities for
them external people are starting to
notice we're excited about being ranked
number 36 you talk about favorite
rankings and that's my favorite I like
them better than US News and and then we
also were the the fifth best value in
the country so we're really happy with
where we are and where we've been but
even more excited about where we're
going
Thanks
[Applause]
[Music]
okay we're almost done you like how they
make the new kid go last I'm Claire
Stewart I'm really delighted to be here
I'm the Dean of libraries I would like
to talk just very quickly mostly I want
to talk about what's coming but share
with you just three highlights from the
past year the first is we hired a new
dean I'm I'm really happy to be here and
so thankful to be working with such an
outstanding community second I wanted to
share that late in 2019 we had 70
million downloads from the University of
Nebraska digital Commons that's the
institutional repository that the
libraries runs that brings Nebraska
research freely to everyone around the
world it's actually the third largest
repository in the country but it is the
most heavily trafficked repository in
the country it's 9 million downloads
ahead of its next closest follower which
is the University of California e
scholarship repository so it's a
tremendous achievement and I think it
shows what a hunger the citizens of the
world have for the research that we do
here at Nebraska this the third thing I
want to share is Chancellor green
already talked about Cory could you give
me three clicks please which is last
year we had the opportunity to begin the
transformation of the cy Thompson
library and to create the Dinsdale
Family Learning Commons and this is
another amazing opportunity that we have
as a community to think about the the
library as a laboratory and and how we
can advance student success how we can
accelerate research and how we can
engage with the community so we have an
incredible opportunity here in
collaboration with our partners at INR
and everyone on East Campus to reimagine
the space and it's a laboratory in a
very literal sense as well our faculty
in the libraries collaborate with
architecture faculty and you care
students to study how informal learning
happens in spaces like the library and
just yesterday actually had an email
from a college of business student who
wants to do a project with our
entrepreneurship class in our library so
we're very proud to have these
opportunities to offer students
exceptional learning experiences next
slide please
and increasingly our future success
depends on us being aggressively
collaborative we all know we cannot do
the work that we do individually in our
field library science we've started to
talk about radical collaboration I
really love this slide because I think
it's a way of looking at this tremendous
the the print collections that we hold
in in North America and if you take away
state and institutional boundaries and
you look at them differently what you
see are these mega regions emerging and
it's it puts Nebraska in a really
interesting place I think a very pivotal
place a connecting point for our print
collections across our country and I'm
very proud that the libraries of the Big
Ten are taking this radical
collaboration idea to heart and trying
to think very differently not only about
how we safeguard and preserve that very
precious cultural and literary history
but how we use it to advance the
problems and solve the problems that we
are all trying to serve solve
collectively next slide please so I'm
gonna wrap up and just share with you
one of the questions that really
motivates us in the libraries when we
think about our role and the obligation
that we have to build a more open
equitable and sustainable information
ecosystem that also means that we have
to give our students the information
skills that they need in their
disciplines to be successful we have to
give them a competitive advantage so
that when that history student graduates
and goes to work at a Nebraska tech
startup or that business student goes to
work at a non-for-profit in in Lincoln
and their boss comes to them on their
first day and says I need you to do
research I need you to go find and
analyze this data I need you to find
company financials for companies a B and
C we want to be confident in the
libraries that we've done our part to
give those students the information
skills that they need we have real
problems I think in our world with
information justice there are stories
that we need to tell voices that we have
heard that have been silenced and the
libraries we believe have a huge role to
play in addressing all of those things
so I am going to stop so that we can
move on to Q&A thank you very much so I
think you can begin to understand why I
said what I said earlier about us being
positioned with academic leadership that
is amongst the best in the country thank
all of our Dean's for their for their
leadership and we are standing between
you and lunch behind us so we're going
to keep it quick here at the end we are
going to establish this as part of our
state of the university tradition and
have the deans and the leadership is
part of that conversation including
making it a time-honored way to report
10 20 25 so just so you know so we're
looking forward to that now we did have
the opportunity for people to send in
questions that we might want to have
some dialogue around and I've got a few
that we're going to work through pretty
quickly here to end this morning and get
ready some of you are going to get them
just to forewarn you first one is can
you explain what it means to be a
Carnegie community engagement campus and
I'm gonna hand the mic to Bob Wilhelm as
a research university we're as
designated is by the Carnegie Foundation
as an r1 the the very highest research
productivity university with respect to
the United States there's another
designation that the Carnegie Foundation
makes they describe they've defined a
rubric that describes the best
characteristics of universities that do
the best at being connected connecting
their academic and their research
missions with the community around them
and beyond them many of these things we
already do in some cases will have to be
more organized in other in other cases
will will need to make bigger
investments and I can tell you more
about it at lunch
thanks Bob that was Bob wilheimer vice
chancellor for research and economic
development second question is you've
spoken about lifelong learning what is
your vision of its importance and what
it should look like in the future and
because she did it so well in her
presentation I'm gonna hand the mic to
Sherry Jones okay so I can think of two
things to say about lifelong learning
just really quick so one Roni mentioned
that the jobs of the future have not
been created yet so if we do not create
lifelong learners they won't be ready to
move into whatever those new jobs might
be so I can think of two things one
right now we have an opportunity with
our own students to instill in them the
spirit of lifelong learning what that
looks like how they should think about
that how they can engage in that so when
they leave us we're confident that they
will be lifelong learners the second
piece is about engaging with ourselves
and our communities and other partners
that we work with so can we leverage
systems that would enable those
individuals to come and be a part of
what we do with our own students and
ourselves so for example the college
houses the iCIJ or Lifelong Learning
Institute and perhaps this might be a
mechanism for our merit as they leave us
our community partners to continue to
advance their own knowledge but also
utilize that mechanism to create a
continuum from students to Ameri tie to
community members who are part of that
Institute perhaps so one thing that
comes to mind thanks sherry and one more
this one's gonna go to Mike be my vice
chancellor for the Institute of Agra
Natural Resources and the question is
what are we doing to feed a hungry world
under a changing climate you heard that
a couple of times in the presentation
this morning Wow small question we're
gonna eat lunch here momentarily
you know just I think every day we wake
up and think about the growing world
that we live in you've all heard the
statistics from roughly seven and a half
billion people on the planet today too
near ten billion people in the year 2050
and they need to eat and you can't eat
without clean water so we think a lot
about water resources Nebraska is famous
for that sitting on top of the Ogallala
Aquifer of course and with 80,000 miles
of streams and rivers but for for
reaching out across the world through
the Daugherty water for food Global
Institute for example so thinking about
food production fuel feed and fiber
production thinking about how to produce
that food for a growing world being
mindful of the resilience of our water
our air our soils and perhaps most
importantly really thinking about people
and the people that produce that food
whether it's large-scale agriculture
like here in Nebraska or small-scale
land holders in sub-saharan Africa we
have a responsibility to work with
people where they are in their local
communities to better their life and
that's what the University of Nebraska
is all about proud to be here I hope
that answered the question
I should tell you those folks didn't
know that we're gonna get those
questions it's a great job on the spot
on answering them I hope that you get
the sense from the state of our
University this morning of the
phenomenal police this institution is
that of the phenomenal work that we do
here of the importance of that work and
what we do here as the people's land
grant University it's a good time to be
in Nebraska it's a good time to be at
the University of Nebraska enjoy lunch
in our birthday cake today for a hundred
and fifty first birthday behind us in
the room up at the top I would draw your
attention while you're there we have two
things that are being exhibited third
during lunch one is the time capsule
that the Nebraska Alumni Association is
putting down for the hundred and seventy
fifth anniversary twenty five years from
now so take a look at that and then also
you'll remember at the beginning of the
N 150 year last year we talked about
University Hall and being able to take
the the scale model of University Hall
the first building on our campus and
learn about it okay Logan Peters they
have a great in 150 lecture about that
this past year they now have the virtual
reality tour done so you're able to see
that and experience that I actually went
and did it myself at any tea a few days
ago it's really cool that is also there
for you so thanks for being here this
morning and it's a great time to be at
Nebraska
[Applause]