At the University Senate meeting in the Knight Library browsing room on Oct. 7, University of Oregon President Michael Schill spoke to the senate during the State of the University address. At the beginning of his speech, he emphasized his excitement to be a part of the UO.
“I’m really pleased and proud to be president of the university,” Schill said. “There’s a huge amount of passion on this campus.”
Schill focused on three main goals that he hoped to attend to while he held the title of president at the university: building tenure-track faculty, maintaining and enhancing affordability for students and continuing labor negotiations with the Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation.
“I need your help rebuilding this university,” Schill said to the senate.
Schill emphasized the importance of building research faculty at the UO, since a lack of research conducted by members of the university community would result in cuts in state funding for the university. He also specified his plan to increase the number of graduate students in programs of excellence that would contribute to the level of research conducted at UO.
When discussing his second goal, Schill said that the university’s four-year graduation rates are at 49 percent for those seeking to obtain a bachelor’s degree, and the university’s six-year graduation rates for a bachelor’s degree are at 69 percent. He expressed his aspiration to improve future graduation rate percentages.
Schill discussed a $3 million fund initiative to improve students’ accessibility to need and merit-based scholarships, and said he hopes to limit tuition increases as much as possible during his presidency. However, he highlighted that tuition increases were inevitable to the university’s future.
“Of course there are going to be tuition increases … but we’re going to do everything we can to keep those tuition increases moderate,” Schill said.
He also discussed a plan to create graduation assistance grants for students that would help subsidize the costs of tuition in order to help them graduate in time, and wanted to financially expand the Pathway Oregon program to further support students with their tuition costs.
President Schill addressed the continuing labor negotiations between the university and the GTFF. He emphasized the importance of greatly increasing university support for graduate students, and Schill also elaborated on a $96 million endowment for supporting those graduate students’ tuition costs.
The senate seemed eager to see how President Schill’s goals would pan out. Bill Harbaugh, senate vice president and UO economics professor, said he looks forward to what the senate can do to achieve these goals.
“I am ecstatic about the chance to work with a UO president who wants to accomplish these goals,” Harbaugh said.