U of I president decries lack of education investment
Saturday, October 17, 2009 11:52 PM PDT
| |
| University of Idaho President Duane Nellis (second from left), is presented with the university medallion and mace during his inauguration at the Kibbie Dome in Moscow, Idaho, on Friday. With Nellis are Idaho Gov. Butch Otter (left), U of I Faculty Senate President Jack Miller (second from right), and Paul Agidius from the Idaho State Board of Education. |
MOSCOW (AP) — The results of a lack of investment in public higher education in Idaho and the rest of the nation are now becoming apparent with increased global competition, University of Idaho President Duane Nellis said.
Speaking Friday at his official inauguration ceremony, Nellis said the origins of the budget problems besetting colleges and universities go back further than the current recession.
‘‘It’s been called a short-term problem by some, but in fact, our nation and our state’s disinvestment in public higher education has been occurring for several decades,’’ he said.
He also said the nation’s current college degree completion rate of 40 percent isn’t good enough and action must be taken to prevent it from falling further.
He said an increasing world population will bring new pressures to U.S. residents.
‘‘Certainly, all of us will be impacted, whether it be economically, ecologically and, most likely, in many other ways,’’ he said.
He said land-grant institutions such as the University of Idaho in particular must increase efforts to prepare young people to ‘‘solve the resource needs of our shrinking planet’’ and be world citizens.
‘‘In response to the increasing complexity of the challenges, public research universities are reinventing the way we innovate, moving from a focus on specialists to an emphasis on teamwork and cooperation among colleagues, disciplines and external collaborators,’’ he said.
He said he wants the University of Idaho, which has a statewide enrollment of 12,000 students, to become more entrepreneurial and increase recruitment of students statewide.
‘‘By the year 2020, our vision for the University of Idaho system is that we have a highly diverse and accomplished student population of more than 16,000 full-time students,’’ he said.
Though the inauguration was Friday, Nellis officially started work as the 17th president of the state’s oldest public university July 1.
