Editor's note: The following are the prepared remarks of President Kirwan's Oct. 16 speech to the University Senate.

State of the University address

Planning for the Future

It is a tradition of the University that at the Senate's first meeting of the fall term, the president delivers the State of the University address. Last year, because I was hardly wet behind the ears as the new president, you graciously gave me a pass. So this is my first report to you on the state of the University. It is an opportunity I relish.

During the past 15 months, I have become totally immersed in the life of this university. I've learned a lot: for example, that parking- or the lack thereof- is just as sensitive an issue at Ohio State as it was at the University of Maryland; that presidents should distance themselves from football ticket allocations (that's one reason you have vice presidents and athletic directors); and that on your first day as president, it's a mistake to wear, even inadvertently, a maize and blue necktie.

But I have learned a lot more. I have gained an enormous appreciation for the quality and uncommon loyalty of people at this university. I have been exhilarated by the dynamism and "can-do" attitude that pervade the campus. And I have been energized by the drive for excellence that is shared throughout our community. I have been deeply impressed by the love and affection people across the state of Ohio, indeed alumni and friends around the world, hold for this university.

Kirwan addresses University Senate on Oct. 16.

Over the course of the year, I have traveled from Toledo to Portsmouth, from Dayton to Youngstown, and from California to India. No matter where you go, people who have ever been associated with Ohio State feel a great affection- almost a reverence- for this university. This vast reservoir of support is an enormous competitive advantage that serves us extremely well.

My task this morning is twofold. First, I will offer a perspective on the state of the University- a snapshot, if you will, of our quest to become one of the nation's preeminent public research universities. Second, I will identify some of the major issues we must address, tasks we must accomplish, if our quest is to be more than a flight of fancy.

In brief, I would describe the state of the University as extremely healthy. While recognizing that we face major challenges, we must also recognize how much we have to celebrate. Our reputation as a leading center of research continues to grow. Sponsored research totaled $193 million through OSURF this past year, and included some especially notable awards: Dr. Rebecca Jackson was awarded a $1.8 million grant from the National Institutes of Health as part of the Women's Health Initiative; a $300,000 award from the U.S. Department of Education to Professors Galal Walker and Diane Birckbichler will allow Ohio State to become a national teaching and learning resource for East Asian languages; Dr. Jeffrey Reutter was awarded $1.2 million from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration to support the work of the Ohio Sea Grant College Program; the Annenberg Foundation recognized the work of Art Education Chair and Professor James Hutchens with a research award of $860,000; and the National Science Foundation awarded $300,000 to the College of Engineering in partnership with historically black colleges and universities to develop an innovative new curriculum.

And the good news just keeps coming in. Just last week, we received news of two grants totaling $18 million from the National Institutes of Health and Aging to support the work of Professor Ron Glaser and his colleagues in eight departments and four separate colleges. These grants will support a study of how stress and aging affect the healing process.

Our faculty continues to pile up impressive honors and awards as well. Four faculty won Guggenheim Fellowships: Robert Davis and Joseph Lynch in history, Richard Davis in near eastern languages and cultures, and Tin-Lun Ho in physics. We are among only a small handful of universities to have four Guggenheim winners in a year. Michael Freitas and Anne McCoy of the Department of Chemistry both won a prestigious Camille and Henry Dreyfus Award. Gerald Gregorek, of the College of Engineering, was one of only six people in the United States selected as a Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. And the National Bar Association selected Dean Greg Williams of our College of Law for the first A. Leon Higginbotham Jr. Award. This is only a sample of the many impressive honors garnered by our faculty.

We also can take pride in the national recognition our undergraduates received. Soraya Rofagha was chosen as one of the nation's 65 Harry S. Truman Scholarship winners, and Jennifer Puckett won a prestigious Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship in Humanistic Studies. We had three Barry M. Goldwater Scholars and four National Science Foundation Research Fellows. This list of what I would call nine "Academic All-Americans" is impressive by the standards of any university.

At the same time, many of our programs received high marks in reputational rankings. U.S. News & World Report ranked our undergraduate program in business 16th in the nation among public and private universities, and engineering was ranked 24th. Earlier this year, our College of Education's graduate program was ranked seventh among all universities and third among all publics. And, for the first time, our James Cancer Hospital and Solove Research Institute was included in the list of the nation's 20 best cancer programs, ahead- I might add- of the cancer programs at the Cleveland Clinic and Stanford University.

Recruiting high-quality faculty and staff

Perhaps the best indication of our rising reputation is our ability to recruit outstanding faculty, staff and students. Exceptional people have many options. They choose to come to Ohio State because they sense our commitment to excellence and our momentum. By any measure, this past year was a stellar recruiting year for us.

We attracted such stars as Jim Williams, Honda Chair of Transportation in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, who is a member of the National Academy of Engineering and former chair, professor and dean of engineering at Carnegie Mellon University; Pamela Hollie, Willard M. Kiplinger Chair in Public Affairs Reporting in the School of Journalism and Communication, who has been a reporter for The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, was a Fulbright lecturer in Asia and taught at Columbia University; Malcolm Chisholm, professor of chemistry and member of Britain's Royal Society, who comes to us from Indiana University; Mauro Ferrari, director of the new Biomedical Engineering Center, who left a professorship at the University of California at Berkeley and who, next Friday, will receive one of the major prizes in his field; Joseph Branin, director of University Libraries and professor, who previously was a professor and dean and director of the libraries at the State University of New York at Stonybrook; Timothy Knowles, vice provost for minority affairs, who comes to us from Meharry Medical College in Nashville; and Lee Tashjian, vice president for university relations, who held senior vice presidencies at the DuPont Corp. and Atlantic Richfield Co.

Much of our success in attracting these exceptional talents is attributable to the high quality of our existing faculty who are, of course, the source of our rising reputation.

Speaking of recruitment, a major effort is now under way in the medical center where, as part of a governance and management reorganization, we have combined the two senior leadership roles into one position to provide greater focus, coherence and accountability. I am confident that we will find an exceptional leader to fill this vitally important position.

Another sign of our impressive progress is the quality of this fall's freshmen- the most academically talented class ever to enroll at Ohio State. Listen to these numbers: The average ACT score is 24.7, up from 24.2 last year and our highest average ever; almost one-third of the freshmen were in the top 10 percent of their high school class and almost two-thirds were in the top 25 percent of their high school class. This group includes nearly 1,300 honors students and 200 class valedictorians. It also contains 112 National Merit Scholars, a 50 percent increase over last fall's total, and 12 National Achievement Scholars, a 100 percent increase over this past year. What makes these numbers especially gratifying is that these highly qualified freshmen include the highest percentages of African-American and Hispanic students in our history.

We have also made great advances this past year in the quality of support services that our students receive ... thanks to the hard work of our dedicated staff. The difference can be summed up in four words: Last year ... long lines; this year ... no lines. No lines at the financial aid office, no lines for dorm room assignments, no lines waiting to move into rooms. Moreover, for the first time ever, entering students "registered live" and received their confirmed class schedules during summer orientation. And speaking of dedicated staff, there has never been a clearer example of staff planning and execution than the remarkable effort so many undertook to make the spring commencement on the Oval such a memorable ceremony.

And what about the phenomenal success we continue to enjoy in private giving! Our total of gifts, pledges and planned giving for this past year was nearly $230 million, by far the largest one-year total in our history. As you no doubt heard this past week, our $1 billion goal for the "Affirm Thy Friendship" Campaign was achieved nine months before the campaign's scheduled conclusion. The impact of this campaign on the academic core of the University is remarkable: 68 new endowed chairs and professorships; $92 million toward student support, which includes 417 endowed scholarship and fellowship funds; and more than $75 million in support of academic facilities construction.

We are now in the elite group of only four public universities ever to complete a $1 billion campaign, another strong indication of our quality and remarkable external support. I want to make special note of the fact that more than $35 million of this total was given by faculty, staff and students. Our annual faculty/staff campaign raises more than any university in the nation. I can think of no better demonstration of the extraordinary affection the members of this community hold for the University and their belief in its future.

We also made significant progress in two areas of outreach and engagement. Under the able leadership of Vice President David Williams and Terry Foegler, the Gateway Project has become a reality. Our developer, Druker and Co., is selecting tenants for the retail, office and housing complexes that will begin to transform the most blighted portion of High Street over the next 18 months.

Equally impressive is the development of our Science and Technology Campus and our technology transfer efforts. Ora Smith, president of the Science and Technology Campus Corp., and David Allen, assistant vice president for technology partnerships in the Office of Research, are providing new energy and bold ideas to develop outlets for the creative endeavors of our faculty.

Facing problems and challenges

In the face of so much extraordinarily good news, one might be tempted to feel a bit smug, even complacent. These are feelings we can ill afford. As some wag once said, when you're on the ladder to success, don't step back to admire your work. All of us assembled here today know that we face significant problems and challenges, which - if not addressed - could reverse our impressive gains and turn our high aspirations into empty rhetoric.

Today, I will focus on six areas of critical importance to our future. In each of these challenging areas, the Senate, its leadership and its committees have an essential role to play in helping devise the necessary strategies and solutions.

Among our greatest challenges is the current state of faculty and staff compensation. Since 1997, we have seen our overall faculty salary position decline from 32nd to 39th among all AAU universities and from third to sixth among our 10 benchmark universities. Hopefully, this past year's 4 percent increment will stabilize our relative standing. A note of special concern is that salaries at the assistant professor level fare worse comparatively than salaries at the upper ranks. One thing is clear to me. If our drive to be among the finest public research universities is to succeed, our salaries must be competitive with the best.

Staff salaries are a comparable concern. While we are market competitive in many job categories, we lag behind in some high-demand skill areas. Again, our aspirations will not be realized if we are unable to attract and retain staff of the highest caliber.

The root cause of our compensation problem is no mystery to any of us. When normalized for institutional size, our state and other revenues do not match those of our aspirational peers. This is an issue we must address, but regrettably cannot expect to completely resolve in the next few years.

While we are working on long-term resource solutions, we need some fresh thinking on how we can increase key elements -- and perhaps the overall value -- of our faculty and staff merit pools and begin to move our salary structure to a more competitive position. The answers will not be easy and surely will require us to make some difficult choices.

Should we, for example, target for raises above the universitywide average those categories of faculty and staff, such as assistant professors, where we are most behind the comparison groups? I am not advocating any particular strategy today, just illustrating the kinds of difficult choices that need attention. I challenge the Faculty Compensation and Benefits Committee and the University Staff Advisory Committee to work closely with Ed Ray, Bill Shkurti and their staff to see if they can develop some new innovative strategies on faculty and staff compensation, without compromising our most important academic enhancement initiatives.

Compensation is by no means our only fiscal challenge. Departmental operating budgets are strained and often inflexible. This fall, we begin the final steps toward the implementation of our new budgeting system. While this system will not -- in and of itself -- solve our resource problems, I am convinced that, done right, it can provide the flexibility and the incentive to begin increasing our resource base. It is vitally important that the Senate and its relevant committees stay engaged with this process. The final product will be improved by the close scrutiny and thoughtful input that is characteristic of the Senate's work.

As the Research Commission pointed out, another key challenge for us is to elevate our research profile. The commission report identified our underachievement in securing contracts and grants as a major impediment to our top-tier aspirations. The report has been reviewed by the Senate and other groups. It is now time to prioritize the report's major recommendations. I intend for this to be a year when -- with the Senate's guidance -- we take major steps to implement this report.

Another matter requiring considerable attention, and of special concern to me, is our failure to substantially improve undergraduate retention and graduation rates. This failure is all the more disturbing in light of the steady rise in the academic profile of our entering class. It is my hope that the Senate and its Council on Enrollment and Student Progress will continue to provide guidance on improving our performance in this area. Ohio State will not be a top-tier institution unless and until our graduation rates are comparable with those of the nation's best public research universities.

One of my gravest concerns is our lack of progress in achieving greater diversity among our faculty, staff and administration. Despite decades of plans and rhetoric, it is discouraging to note that, for example, the number of African-American faculty at Ohio State has not increased measurably during the past decade. And, while we have shown success in recruiting more women faculty, their departure rates have undermined any net gains.

It should be a matter of concern for all of us that, among our 125 or so department chairs, deans and vice presidents, we have only two African-American and five Asian-American department chairs, two African-American academic deans, one African-American vice president, and we have fewer than 25 women and no Hispanics in any of these positions. This is not acceptable. And it is another area where we lag considerably behind many of our aspirational peers. If you believe, as I do, that diversity is not a luxury but an absolute necessity in building a great 21st century university, you will agree that we cannot allow this situation to continue.

At the provost's and my request, David Williams and Dean Carole Anderson are chairing a special task force, which includes representation from the Senate's Diversity Committee. This task force is preparing a draft Diversity Plan that sets universitywide diversity goals, proposes specific strategies aimed at moving us aggressively toward those goals, and identifies measures to assess progress and assure accountability.

I will submit this plan to the Senate for its consideration and recommendations later this fall. To make the kind of progress we need to make, we must have clear goals, strategies and performance measures that enjoy strong support from all corners of the University. On this most important of issues, I hope the Senate will join me in the determined and outspoken leadership that success with this effort will require.

A final major concern I will share with you today is the state of our physical facilities. Although some magnificent new structures and impressive renovations have been completed, and others are under way, we have too many outmoded and dilapidated laboratories, offices and classrooms, not to mention residence halls and other auxiliary facilities. While the state budget provides a systematic means of addressing our facilities needs, given the limits of the state capital budget, the pace of progress is unacceptably slow. Fortunately, we are beginning to have some success in raising private funds to accelerate this pace. For example, we just received two major gifts to support the transformation of Hagerty Hall into the World Media and Culture Center.

In this regard, I want to make special mention of the Main Library. The Senate received a very thoughtful report on the need for a total renovation of this space. This is a recommendation that I wholeheartedly endorse. Preliminary planning has begun for a major campaign to make this recommendation a reality. I will consider it a great disappointment if this university treasure is not restored to its original dignity and equipped with state-of-the-art library resources during my tenure as president.

Developing a strategic plan

The list of challenges I have discussed today by no means exhausts all of the issues that need attention. An observation I will make is that, as a university, we have identified many problems and we have a large number of strategies, plans, committees and dedicated individuals making daily contributions to advance the University. What we do not have, and what we badly need, is a unified, comprehensive, coherent strategy -- a single plan if you will -- that articulates goals, strategies and metrics.

Such a plan -- which I will call an academic plan -- is an absolute necessity if we, as a community, are to establish a shared understanding of how our limited resources should be directed toward our common commitments and institutional goals. It is the only way that we can systematically calibrate the impact of our initiatives and, thereby, make necessary mid-course corrections based on objective analyses.

During the past several months, the vice presidents and I have begun the work of putting such a plan together. It draws upon existing planning efforts, such as the Research Commission Report and the CUE and G-QUE reports, but it also includes new thinking, such as is found in the draft Diversity Plan. We make no assumption that we have gotten it right yet. But the provost and I feel that the draft document will allow us to begin a very important conversation with the entire University community that will lead to a plan containing widely shared goals, strategies, and standards for accountability.

I'd like to give you a glimpse of what the draft will contain. It will describe a core set of values for the University -- such as integrity, the pursuit of truth, freedom of expression, diversity and community. It will articulate a vision of Ohio State as one of the nation's preeminent public research universities and the nation's exemplar in establishing a land-grant mission and agenda relevant for the 21st century.

The plan will make clear that our overarching goal is to achieve distinction as an academic institution. It will contain four major goals, aligned with the four themes I articulated in my investiture speech.

Beginning with our pursuit of academic excellence, the plan will call for the continuation of the strategic investment and academic enrichment programs, but it also will call for new initiatives, some tied to the Research Commission Report. In particular, it will call for a faculty development program for all faculty. The program will include an investment in recruitment of national academy-caliber eminent scholars to our campus and in the development of comparable faculty from within our existing ranks.

A second goal in the plan will be the development of a distinguished undergraduate program as measured in part by the caliber of students we attract and the rate at which they graduate. But the plan also will call for new initiatives, such as the creation of an array of academic living-learning centers, modeled in part on the success of our Honors Program, but focused on a broader group of students clustered according to academic themes and interests. We began such an initiative this fall when we launched the Mount Leadership Society with 52 freshmen now sharing a rich learning experience about leadership and enjoying direct interaction with our faculty.

Building on this model, we will add other programs with different themes next fall. The idea is to create smaller learning communities that can take advantage of a more intimate academic environment but also draw upon the vast resources of a major research university. In my view, our goal should be to offer such a learning environment to every undergraduate who wants this kind of experience.

The goals for diversity will be based on the Diversity Plan I mentioned a few moments ago. Here, I believe it will be especially important to be specific about our goals, strategies and means of assessing progress, for this is an area where good will is necessary -- but not sufficient. It is an area where leadership at the top -- both in words and deeds -- is essential. I fully intend to meet my own responsibilities in this regard and to hold the vice presidents and deans accountable for meeting theirs.

The fourth goal speaks to our land-grant mission and responsibility. One of our university's major points of pride is the national leadership Ohio State provided throughout the 20th century in defining the land-grant role and serving the needs of the state and nation. For much of the century, these needs were derived from an agrarian and industrial economy.

The academic plan will call for Ohio State to step forward and, without neglecting our historic role, become the leader in reinventing the land-grant mission in an information age and for an urban-based economy. Fortunately, we have the work of the President's Council on Outreach and Engagement to draw upon in determining the most important initiatives for us to pursue. At a minimum, these include our involvement in K-12 education, state and regional economic development, health care delivery, and lifelong learning opportunities through distance learning and other technology innovations.

The final section of the academic plan will discuss strategies for developing and allocating the resources necessary to make the plan a success. Obviously, this will be closely connected to the new budget system we will begin implementing next year.

Measuring our progress

An essential element of the plan will be a set of benchmarks to assess our initiatives and measure progress toward our goals. I intend to include this assessment of progress with the academic plan as part of my annual State of the University address to the Senate.

A draft document will be ready for distribution to the Senate and more broadly within a few weeks. We are genuinely seeking advice and input because such a plan will be meaningless without a broad base of support and ownership. My admittedly ambitious expectation is that the review and advice period will conclude early in the winter term. Based on the recommendations we receive, a final document will be prepared and submitted to the Board of Trustees for endorsement at the Board's February meeting.

The schedule is ambitious and so is the scope of the plan. How, some may ask, can the University make substantial progress in so many different areas simultaneously? This brings me to today's final topic: the nature of the faculty reward structure. This is a matter I have pondered for many years, and it is an area where I believe Ohio State can establish a position of national leadership.

Simply stated, I believe the reward structure at research universities, especially land-grant universities, is not just outmoded; it is flawed. It is based on the premise that faculty will sustain 40- to 45-year careers, making a more or less constant division of commitment to research, teaching and service. In truth, there are few who can do so.

The reality is, as Ernest Boyer so eloquently points out in his monograph Scholarship Reconsidered, that there are "seasons" in the careers of most academics ... seasons when creativity blossoms, seasons when the desire to contribute in the classroom burns brightest and seasons when the desire to make a contribution to the larger community might flourish. But the rigid reward structure at most universities does not accommodate these seasons. As a result, most universities fail to optimize the enormous range of talent and energy that exists within their faculty.

Now, before anyone misinterprets what I'm saying, let me state unequivocally that I support the primacy of our research mission. As a major research university, we must insist that -- with rare exception -- anyone granted tenure have highly significant scholarly contributions and hold promise of becoming a national leader in his or her field. It is the research expertise of our faculty that distinguishes us and gives special value to our teaching and service efforts.

But tenure comes within the first six years of appointment. For many, that still leaves decades in which they can contribute to the total mission of the University. It is with our tenured faculty that we can, and in my opinion should, enlarge our reward structure to encourage a broader range of contributions by faculty -- according to the various seasons of faculty careers. Indeed, I see no other way we can achieve our varied and ambitious goals.

I believe Ohio State is especially well-positioned to revamp the traditional reward structure. We are a university rooted in the land-grant spirit and, therefore, have considerable experience in supporting and evaluating meaningful outreach activities.

Moreover, the Senate passed a wise policy a few years ago delegating responsibility for a major portion of the reward structure -- the promotion and tenure standards -- to the colleges. This could be a very important and necessary step in developing an expanded reward structure. We need to augment the Senate's action by assigning responsibility for meeting broad performance objectives to our colleges and departments. We then need to empower chairs with the authority to negotiate individual responsibilities according to the specific interests and talents of individual faculty.

Not only would such a system enhance the work of the departments, and therefore of the colleges and the University, but it would also give individual faculty members a more fulfilling sense of contribution to the University's total advancement.

I realize we are several steps away from such a system. However, there is an important document entitled Report of the Commission on Faculty Development and Careers that was created through the work of a 13-member commission appointed by the provost. This report has been submitted to the Senate. I urge the Senate to give this report very careful review and analysis, especially as it might relate to an expanded reward structure, and I invite the Senate to provide me with its recommendations on the implementation of the report.

So that is my assessment of the state of the University and an indication of some of the most important challenges we must address during the rest of this year and in the coming years. I remain as optimistic about our future today as I did on that "heady" day in January 1998, when I accepted the offer to become president of this remarkable university. I truly believe we are blessed to be at Ohio State at this time, a time that comes rarely in the life of a university.

While we have enormous obstacles to overcome, I am convinced we can be one of those rare universities that actually rises to the top tier of academic institutions, not one of the many that just espouse such an ambition.

To be sure, our path is long and steep. But I sense a resolve and a willingness within this community to make the climb. And I am as thankful for the opportunity to be part of the trek as I am determined to reach the summit with you.