Report by President Ray Cross to the Board of Regents
- More than 50 volunteers came to Memorial Park at UW-Platteville recently to plant 4,000 seedlings. You will recall that it was just about a year ago that an EF-2 tornado swept through the park, as well as the campus and the city of Platteville, destroying thousands of trees. The Platteville Community Arboretum received a $19,000 Urban Forestry Catastrophic Storm Grant from the Department of Natural Resources, and that funding was turned over to the university to purchase the trees, including silky dogwood, hackberry, sycamore, and river birch. Dr. Yari Johnson, an assistant professor and director of reclamation, environment and conservation in the School of Agriculture, says the experience not only shows students what a destructive tornado can do to a natural area, but also how people can help recover from that devastation.
- UW-Parkside Chancellor Debbie Ford has been named one of Milwaukee Business Journal’s 2015 Women of Influence This is the 16th year that The Business Journal has honored Milwaukee’s most influential women, the cream of the crop of the city’s professional community. They’ve grown businesses, created products, inspired future generations and made the community a better place. Chancellor Ford will be among the 28 winners honored at an awards event to be held June 12 at the Wisconsin Center in Milwaukee. Congratulations, Debbie!
- An innovative plan by a group of UW-River Falls students to market a biodegradable soap pod earned them a top spot at an international business competition last month. The students and their creation — the SōPOD — reached the semifinals of the International Business Model Competition in Provo, Utah, placing among the top 22 contenders in a field of more than 3,800 teams from 276 schools and 15 countries. The competitors were judged on their ability to test their hypotheses in the field and to develop a business model. This is not the first success for the SōPOD team … Earlier this year, they took first place in the second annual Wisconsin Big Idea tournament, and received a $25,000 Ideadvance seed grant from UW-Extension.
- UW-Superior has won a $50,000 federal grant to preserve hundreds of technical drawings from Fraser Shipyard of Superior and to make them more accessible to researchers and the general public. The drawings include working design documents and blueprints of such well-known vessels as the Edmund Fitzgerald, the Mackinaw, the Leon Fraser, and others. The award was announced recently by the National Park Service, in partnership with the Maritime Administration, as part of a $2.6-million package of grants to 18 projects nationwide that preserve and teach about the nation’s maritime history. Professor Laura Jacobs, interim director of UW-Superior’s Jim Dan Hill Library, was lead investigator on the project. Work is expected to start on the project this summer.
- UW-Milwaukee is joining forces with four other academic institutions to form a local site of the National Innovation Network that will recruit and train 90 entrepreneurial teams over the next three years. With training, the teams will conduct deep research into their chances of starting a viable business or find new pathways to market. The effort, funded by a $300,000 National Science Foundation Innovation-Corps (NSF I-Corps) grant, brings together academic researchers, graduate students and business networks to grow the local economy through research-generated ideas that are honed in collaboration with industry. Led by the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, the site’s partners include Marquette University, the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW), the Milwaukee School of Engineering (MSOE,) and Concordia University of Wisconsin.
- Three undergraduates – Amanda Ali Taha of UW-Fox Valley, Madeline Gore of UW-Madison, and Jasmine McClure of UW-Milwaukee – were recently named winners of the annual UW System Liberal Arts Essay Scholarship Competition. The competition, now in its 10th year, invited students to discuss a time in their college educations when they made connections between a humanities class and a science class that resulted in unexpected and meaningful insights. Winners each receive a $2,000 scholarship to help fund the remainder of their undergraduate education. Honorable mentions were awarded also to two student writers: Meagan Kelly of UW-Madison, and Erin Ross of UW-La Crosse.
- A new computer programming language for creating 3-D models is generating a lot of buzz in computer science and education circles. UW-Eau Claire assistant professor of computer science Chris Johnson created Madeup, a program that allows people to code shapes and print them as 3-D models. More than that, the program also is a way to explore math and computation ideas – which makes Madeup appealing to educators as well. The innovative project received immediate and strong support from many on Kickstarter.com, with more than 50 friends and strangers combining to meet Dr. Johnson’s funding goals in less than a week. Dr. Johnson is now working on creating a desktop version of his program to meet the needs of even more users. It’s targeted for release in summer of 2016.
- For only the second time in UW-Stevens Point’s 121-year history, the university conferred an honorary doctorate. Wisconsin’s longest-serving congressman David Obey received the degree at the May 16th commencement ceremonies in recognition of his strong support of higher education and programs at UW-Stevens Point and beyond. Congressman Obey, who grew up in Wausau, helped UW-Stevens Point secure funding for the Wisconsin Institute for Sustainable Technology and the Geographic Information Systems Training Center, among other things. His extensive papers are now available to the public through the Archives and Area Research Center at the UW-Stevens Point University Library. Obey donated the collection to the Wisconsin Historical Society.
- A group of students in UW-Stout’s cross-media graphics management program are on a roll – literally. The students were recently commissioned by Dunn County Transit – Menomonie’s public bus service – to do something about the company’s plain white vehicles. Led by designer and project manager Kelsy-Ann Hayes, a senior from Sturgeon Bay, four students designed highly visible, colorful graphics under the theme of “Enroute: Driving Community Together.” The images – which include the UW-Stout Clock Tower – were created with a software program, and then large-format graphics were produced in a printing lab. The results have been a big hit. “It’s a project students should be proud of,” said Dunn County Transit director Kent Conklin. “It has very high visibility content for a student project, and it’s a big thing for us.”
- UW-Madison continues to be one of the state of Wisconsin’s greatest economic engines, accounting for $15 billion in economic impact statewide according to a new report conducted by NorthStar Consulting. The report shows that UW-Madison, UW Hospital and Clinics, and the university’s affiliated organizations and startup companies support 193,310 Wisconsin jobs and generate more than $847.5 million in state and local tax revenue. That’s up from 128,146 jobs and $614 million in tax revenue the last time a similar study was completed in 2011.
- UW-La Crosse leads the country in awarding four-year physics degrees, according to a ranking by the American Physical Society. Between 20011 and 2013, UW-La Crosse granted an average of 31 physics degrees. Tied for second place were SUNY College at Genesco and the U.S. Naval Academy. The rankings only consider institutions that grant bachelor’s degrees but not graduate degrees. UW-La Crosse was cited for its wide variety of programs, one-on-one advising, its undergraduate research, and extracurricular activities including student organizations and public lectures by award-winning physicists. Other UW System campuses to make the list were UW-Eau Claire and UW-River Falls.
- A new public-private partnership aimed at encouraging businesses to leverage the expertise and energy of UW-Green Bay faculty, staff and students with the leadership transformation services of InitiativeOne was recently launched with a memorandum of understanding signed by Chancellor Gary Miller and InitiativeOne founder and CEO Fred Johnson. The intent is for InitiativeOne’s team of professionals to work with UW-Green Bay’s Austin E. Cofrin School of Business faculty to explore and develop a series of projects and programs that will positively influence the greater Green Bay business community. InitiativeOne also will help place UW-Green Bay student interns on projects.
- Art major Neta Ron, a new graduate of UW-Whitewater, has won a prestigious Tiffany & Co. Foundation scholarship to pursue her interest in metalsmithing and jewelry. What’s more, Neta has also been accepted into the graduate program at the highly selective Rhode Island School of Design. The school’s jewelry and metalsmithing program only accepts up to six students a year, with applicants from all over the world. Neta, who is from Israel, says she’s grateful for her undergraduate experience at UW-Whitewater because it provided her with critical communication skills in addition to the creative environment to pursue her craft.
- The Ho-Chunk Nation and UW-Marshfield/Wood County are celebrating a partnership that ultimately may help preserve and perpetuate the Ho-Chunk language. At a time when it’s estimated there are only about 100 fluent Ho-Chunk speakers left, the new one-year Ho-Chunk Educators’ Certification Program will assist with training educators to pass the language on to students and future generations. Ho-Chunk Nation President Jon Greendeer, a graduate of UW-Marathon County and UW-Stevens Point, called the partnership (quote) “as historic as it is essential.”
- Ten UW-Oshkosh student entrepreneurs recently completed a 12-week accelerator program offered by the Alta Resources Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation. The program provided students with the opportunity to work with business mentors, a start-up curriculum, and one-on-one consulting, along with $5,000 in seed money to help develop their business ideas. Student teams then pitched their ideas to Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch and former “Shark Tank” investor Kevin Harrington. As one student described the experience, “We learned so much. They gave us the tools, and it was up to us to make it happen.” Chancellor Andrew Leavitt said university leaders have taken note of the center’s success and are working to incorporate some of its components into the College of Business curriculum.
- I also wanted to call your attention to a hot-off-the-press copy of “WisconsinBiz” magazine in your folders. Now in its third year, the publication – which UW System co-sponsored – is part of the state’s economic development marketing plan. The 2015 edition focuses on people making a difference in Wisconsin. In it, you’ll find examples of how the university is actively reaching out to state businesses to partner with them; third-party testimonials of the power that the UW brings to the state’s economic engine; and updated information on the UW Flexible Option initiative, and much more. If you’d like additional copies, just contact our office.
- Immediately following our last meeting, hosted by UW-Waukesha, I had the pleasure of taking part in the inauguration of UW Colleges and UW-Extension Chancellor Cathy Sandeen. It was a simple and joyful event, with many colleagues and friends in attendance – including a good number of you here in this room. As the former chancellor of those two institutions, I have a special appreciation of the opportunities and challenges that Colleges and Extension have before them … and I’d like to express my deep satisfaction in having Cathy at the helm. Despite having been on the job for less than six months, she has navigated some very difficult decisions amid a very challenging budget environment – and she has done so with great poise and purpose. That’s why I was gratified to hear that a recent referendum regarding her leadership failed. And, in fact, almost two-thirds of Colleges’ faculty weighed in in support of the chancellor. At this time, I would just like to reiterate my complete confidence in Chancellor Sandeen. Her leadership should be applauded.
- Finally, we have several news items about the UW Flexible Option Program. First, UW-Extension and UW-Milwaukee received notice just last Friday from the U.S. Department of Education that all of the UW-Milwaukee Flex Option programs are now approved to award Title IV aid. Together with the approval that UW Colleges received late last year, the University of Wisconsin continues to be the first – and only – public university system in the country to be granted this approval. For that matter, nationwide only six institutions of any kind have been approved to award aid using “direct assessment” and “non-term.”
- UW-Extension, UW Colleges and UW-Milwaukee are now working hard to create the operations and procedures that will allow Flex students to receive financial aid. UW Colleges students will begin to receive aid this summer, and UW-Milwaukee students will follow later in the fall.
- Second, we are proud to share that the UW Flex programs at UW Colleges and UW-Milwaukee both had successful site visits with the Higher Learning Commission. UWM received its notice just this week of their site team’s positive recommendation to the HLC; UW Colleges received a similar notice about a month ago. Both are now awaiting final confirmation from HLC’s institutional Action Council in the next month or so. In the meantime – and this merits real congratulation – both site teams were so impressed with what they learned from us that they thanked our institutions for blazing trails for the rest of the nation about how to develop high quality competency-based education. They heralded UW Flex as setting THE national standard. Well done UW-Extension, UW Colleges, and UW-Milwaukee, and everyone involved with building UW Flexible Option programs!
That concludes my report for today.