HR: 10:50h
AN: ED11C-03    [PDF]
TI: Building a Geoscience Program in an Adverse Fiscal Climate: Keys to Success
AU: * Hooper, R L
EM: hooperrl@uwec.edu
AF: University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire, Department of Geology, Eau Claire, WI 54702 United States
AB: Despite an almost 50 percent decline nationwide in undergraduate geoscience enrollment between 1995 and 2002 the Department of Geology at the University of Wisconsin - Eau Claire has experienced a 20 percent increase in the number of majors and minors studying geology over the same period. The department now has 90 majors/minors studying geology in an institution with 10,000 student headcount. In the face of declining State support for public higher-education and eroding university budgets, the Department of Geology has also added two faculty positions and over 1.3 million dollars in new laboratory equipment over the same period of time. Keys to building a successful program have been faculty recruitment and retention efforts, an increased emphasis on excellence in undergraduate collaborative research, attention to building a faculty and student community of scholars, and collaborative promotional work with other science departments. In addition considerable efforts have been devoted to explicitly recruiting top quality students from introductory courses and effectively using students to promote the department at the local, regional and national level. Recruiting top quality faculty is crucial and has required competitive salary packages, significant start-up funding and negotiating spousal hires within an extremely tight fiscal climate. Retaining faculty also requires attention to salary issues especially salary compression. One key to our success has been the undergraduate student's willingness to support high-priority academic activities such as collaborative research, technology initiatives and department capstone field experiences through a university-wide voluntary tuition surcharge. Many of the strategies that have been successful at UW-Eau Claire are transferable to other institutions.
DE: 6605 Education
SC: Education and Human Resources [ED]
MN: 2003 Fall Meeting