Tree of hope shines bright

By Jim Brown Ellen Tressel, left, wife of Coach Jim Tressel, watches as Connie Tressel, wife of Assistant Coach Dick Tressel, makes the connection to illuminate the 2003 Tree of Hope Dec. 5 in front of The James. The tree, a 30-foot Douglas fir, is a gift from Ray Shaner of Springboro, Ohio, in memory of his wife Carol, who was a patient at The James before her death from pancreatic cancer in 2000.

Academics and industry pursue excellence through CEMM

By RANDY GAMMAGE, onCAMPUS staff

The Center for Excellence in Manufacturing Management (CEMM) has come a long way in its quest to bring leaders of industry and academics together to solve today's challenges and educate tomorrow's manufacturers.

Located at 660 Fisher Hall, the center was started in 1992 with four member organizations and funding from the Fisher College of Business. Today, it has 18 members, is self-funded and contributes direct financial benefits to the Fisher College of Business.

The CEMM attracted in excess of 600 executives to professional development seminars on campus last year, and placed 34 Fisher College of Business students in internships or full-time positions at member companies, said CEMM Co-Director John Dix.

Member companies use the CEMM as a hub for accessing the vast resources of Ohio State.

"There are lots of resources at this university, but if you are on the outside looking in it can be rather intimidating finding the right person to talk to," Dix said.

The center's mission is to develop a consortium of business leaders, educators and researchers who share a common goal of achieving world-class excellence in manufacturing firms through education, research and outreach (networking). Companies are recruited that are not in competition with current members, and that brings open commuinication and enhanced willingness to share best practices between the member companies as well as with the university, Dix said.

The consortium allows businesses to learn from each other, and from nationally-recognized experts and speakers that they otherwise would not have access to, said Tim Eades, vice president of operations for Ross Products division of Abbott Laboratories, a CEMM charter member since 1992.

"That's a great benefit to our company and something that we could not do on our own," he said.

Outreach/networking

Eades said his company periodically consults with fellow members of the center and Ohio State faculty such as CEMM Co-Director William Berry and Peter Ward, CEMM research and communications director, to help solve manufacturing problems or challenges. Center-sponsored sounding boards have provided valuable insight on issues such as hiring and recruiting, line changeovers, lean manufacturing, and cost control measures.

"It's like having a whole room of consultants at your fingertips to help you," Eads said.

Like all CEMM member companies, Ross Products sends its executives into the classrooms of Fisher College to share real-world business experiences with OSU students. They also hire students from the undergraduate and MBA programs as summer interns and later as full-time staff.

"You wouldn't have that type of connection were it not for CEMM membership," Eades said. "They are a conduit for us to acquire the future leaders of our business."

Other outreach or networking opportunities include feedback sessions, a manufacturers forum, a newsletter and a Web site (http://fisher.osu.edu/cemm).

Research

Dix said CEMM conducts and supports research that advances knowledge and helps solve today's problems in manufacturing, making the member companies more competitive in their industries. In addition, the research often provides material and information valuable to faculty research and classroom content.

"What makes us different from most university centers is that we are focused on helping these companies solve whatever problems they are facing today," Dix said.

Forms of research include:

• Member-funded research. Member companies identify issues or subjects they are struggling with and work with students and faculty to develop and conduct customized research aimed at solving problems.

• Grant-funded research. Outside agencies or companies provide funds for research that address issues of interest to member companies and is consistent with faculty research programs.

• CEMM-supported research. CEMM may fund research conducted by faculty, with a managerial summary and scholarly output resulting.

In recognition of the global competition of manufacturing, CEMM faculty have established a field research relationship with the Danish Technical University and a long-term relationship with Industry Week Magazine, Dix said. CEMM researchers analyzed application data from all past winners and finalists in Industry Week's Best Plant program and provided the publication with a database that serves as the core of their "Best Plant" benchmarking product.

Education

Each quarter, professional development seminars bring renowned national speakers to Fisher College. Morning sessions are for CEMM members only, while afternoon programs are outreach affairs that bring members, non-member manufacturing management companies, and student chapters of professional trade organizations together to participate in discussions, networking and open forums, Dix said.

Additionally, the CEMM actively supports the executive education efforts of the Fisher College through the development, presentation and sponsorship of programs designed to meet the needs of manufacturing management.

Staffing

The CEMM is staffed on a part-time basis, yet successfully provides benefits of membership to member companies. Dix is president of Business Development Index, LTD, a Columbus management-consulting firm. Berry is a professor and Ward an associate professor, both of management sciences in the Fisher College. Nancy Lahmers, CEMM administrative director, and Margaret Pennington, administrative manager and adjunct professor of management sciences, provide additional support.

Future goals

Future goals include selectively increasing membership, developing programs for smaller companies and striving to earn a global reputation.

"We want to become a worldwide organization known for problem solving and leading-edge thinking," Dix said.

For more information, visit http://fisher.osu.edu/cemm.

Graduate School focuses on academic 'package'

New initiatives assist students in post-collegiate preparation, opportunities

By JONI BENTZ SEAL, onCAMPUS staff

Much to the delight of Dean Susan Huntington, the top three reasons students choose Ohio State's Graduate School are the school's reputation in the field or discipline; the university's overall academic reputation; and the research and scholarly opportunities available here.

"If we are to continue on the institutional path to true excellence, we must compete for and attract the highest quality graduate students," she told trustees in a presentation at the Nov. 7 board meeting. "To a large extent, institutions are measured by their graduate programs, so if we want to reach the goals of the Academic Plan, we need to pay attention to the complete graduate package offered. The needs of these students extend well beyond the classroom and the laboratory."

With more than 120 master's and nearly 100 doctoral programs (professional degrees, such as the M.D., D.D.S., J.D., D.O. and D.V.M. are not housed in the Graduate School), Ohio State offers strong graduate preparation for careers in teaching, research, public service, business, engineering, health sciences and many other professions. In fact, Ohio State is a leading doctoral degree granting institution in the United States, ranking 8th in the nation between 1998 and 2002 with 3,074 doctoral degrees granted. But while well versed in preparing its graduates for careers in teaching and research, the university hasn't always done as much to counsel students in preparation for non-academic careers.

Prompted in part by the 2001 Graduate Quality of University Experience (G-QUE) report, which was co-sponsored by the Council of Graduate Students, the Graduate School now offers a number of opportunities through several new initiatives to enhance the quality and the comfort of the whole academic experience -- the whole "package."

"We feel we're adding a vital learning experience beyond the classroom," Huntington said. "The G-QUE launched some very explicit recommendations and has helped us change our thinking about what it means to offer a quality graduate experience here. There are many important issues that extend beyond the classroom -- such as professional development, skill enhancement and social relations -- and they have become requisite to the total educational experience."

Enriched and engaged

To ensure these aspects of the graduate experience are carried out, the Graduate School created a position last year and recruited Yolanda Zepeda as director of enrichment and professional development. While hired to create programs and opportunities for all graduate students, Zepeda is responsive to the particular needs of minority students (Ohio State has consistently ranked 4th or higher in the nation in granting doctoral degrees to African- American students), and those in other "special populations" -- including international students.

"Enrichment is one of the most important things we do in the Graduate School," Zepeda said. "We've done a wonderful job counseling students about their academic careers, but since many of our students select careers outside of research-intensive universities, we have to do a better job exposing them to the different career options available to them."

Zepeda has created or enhanced programs that provide support and information about student wellness, offer professional development opportunities and workshops, and even lure undergraduates into the "pipeline" of academic and research careers at the graduate level, and possibly into faculty positions. The beauty of her job, Zepeda says, is that as needs arise, she is in a position to respond and create whatever mechanism will meet that need.

As one example, Zepeda pointed out that graduate students -- because they are considered experienced collegians -- generally receive a less extensive orientation or introduction to the university than do undergraduates, even though they may be new to OSU.

"There are so many resources and facilities on campus, but our students often don't know about them, so part of my job is to bring students to those services and bring the services to the students," she said. "However, one of the sensitivities in my role is not to duplicate anything being done elsewhere in the university, but to assist these service experts in developing their offerings with consideration of the needs of graduate students."

For instance, Zepeda explains, Career Connection does a great job with career counseling and has the tools and experience to help both graduate and undergraduate students consider and prepare for careers. "I now know the staff well and work with them to include the graduate population in their service plans and to ensure that students know about this resource," she said.

To keep her finger on the pulse of what graduate students need and to communicate her services, Zepeda attends the meetings of various groups and student organizations, including the student government bodies. She said she is amazed at how word spreads about the things that are happening in the Graduate School.

Still, there is always room for improvement. One goal Huntington mentioned at the November board meeting was to increase the number of students who are supported as graduate associates. Such positions both help students pay for their education and serve as important professional development experiences.

She also would like to see more support for graduate studies chairs, who she said provide "such a substantial service to the university" in student recruitment, financial aid and data collection.

And, while graduate education on a national level sees a high concentration of minority students in certain fields, Zepeda said she would like to see them participating fully in all different fields.

Huntington feels confident that students considering graduate school will continue to ask: "Where is the best place for me to pursue my education?" And while academic strength should certainly be the primary consideration, she said students are increasingly looking at the whole educational package.

"We converted this mindset into a program that looks at the entire experience of students," she said. "We have tried -- and will continue to target the areas that will benefit a student as a whole. There is no dollar amount you can name that recognizes the value of a student who takes his or her Ohio State graduate experience and goes off into the world and succeeds."

Visit the Graduate School Web site at www.gradsch.ohio-state.edu/.

Hidden Ohio State treasures finding home in marketplace

By SUSAN WITTSTOCK, onCAMPUS staff

At the Cartoon Research Library, Curator Lucy Shelton Caswell is used to assisting researchers studying items in her collection: editorial cartoons; comic strips; Japanese manga comic books; popular illustrated magazines from the 1900s and earlier.

At Trademark and Licensing Services, Director Rick Van Brimmer is used to licensing athletics-oriented products: teddy bears in football jerseys; baseball caps adorned with Block Os; framed photographs depicting Ohio Stadium.

Van Brimmer, Caswell and other curators of University Libraries' special collections, have partnered together to try something new: The Ohio State University Treasury of Fine Art.

The treasury, which got its start in 2001, seeks to market the thousands of comics, illustrations, paintings and sketches owned by the university, slowly building a manufacturing base selling everything from mugs displaying flirty Flapper comics to frame-worthy botanical illustrations. A majority of the revenues will be funneled back to the units that provide the images.

"We had all of these treasures hidden in our archives and libraries, primarily used for research and the academic mission," said Van Brimmer, who began thinking of a possible treasury after informal discussions with the special collections' curators. "On the marketing side, my brain was telling me we have a lot of desirable pieces and maybe there's a way we can capitalize on that. So, we started looking at what they had."

Van Brimmer gathered a few of the images, collected from the Cartoon Research Library, the University Archives and the Rare Books and Manuscripts Collection, and took them to a licensing show in New York, where manufacturers look for images they can license to use on their products. The response was positive, so Van Brimmer decided the idea was worth pursuing. A special marketing package was developed -- a large envelope designed to look like an art crate and filled with picture cards organized in the categories of Nature, Sport, Art Nouveau and Illuminated Manuscripts -- and sent to about 700 manufacturers.

"We got a few nibbles and some bites," Van Brimmer said. A wallpaper company (www.4walls.com) is now offering borders and murals using artwork from football program covers from the early 1900s, taken from the University Archives. Other companies are now selling large lithographs and drink coasters of the football programs, prints of Art Nouveau drawings, and prints of the birds nest illustrations -- taken from a book published in the 1800s.

There's no lack of university-owned artwork. "That's probably been one of our biggest challenges," Van Brimmer said. "There's thousands of images to sift through. To use them, we have people literally going through drawers, even finding items that haven't yet been cataloged."

Cartoonist Group, a California-based Web company (www.cartoonistgroup.com/properties/OSU/search.php), purchased nearly 1,000 images from the Cartoon Research Library this fall, and is in the process of making them all available online. Images can be selected by customers and placed on products like coffee mugs, t-shirts and mouse pads or purchased for use in newsletters and presentations. The site also allows users to send a free e-card.

"In the world of cartoons, Lucy Caswell and Ohio State are incredibly well respected," said Sara Thaves, founder of Cartoonist Group, and daughter of "Frank & Ernest" cartoonist Bob Thaves. "I have the utmost respect for the work they are doing at the research library. It's a real honor to be affiliated with it."

Thaves is happy to have access to the world's largest collection of vintage cartoons. "One way Cartoonist Group is different from other databases is the diversity of our collection. No other database can say that they have not only current cartoons, but archival content as well."

"If Sara wants fishing or hunting images, we can give her 40 to 50 to choose from," Caswell said. "We try to select images that are not only representative of the subject areas she is looking for, but marketable as well."

Marketable images will translate into a new source of revenue for the library, made all the more valuable as higher education budgets become tighter and tighter. "It's a serious effort to supplement funding so we can continue with our basic operations, and also maybe take on some of those projects we can't currently afford to do," Caswell said. "Trademark and licensing has created a very equitable arrangement, by taking care of the legal aspects and the marketing in exchange for a portion of the profits. It's a great partnership."

Thaves hopes her customers will view the Web site as a way to help support the library's academic mission. "I hope this can be something people within the Ohio State community come to view as an asset as well -- that they can go to the database and find images for diverse purposes and know it has added value for them because it supports the university," she said.

Van Brimmer isn't aware of any other universities broadly marketing materials taken from their academic collections, but said the idea itself is not unique. "The major museums do this all the time," he said. "The majority of licensed products we have available now are athletics-oriented. These new products are evergreen properties, in that they aren't going to be dependent on the success of the teams to sell well. And, it's nice to offer items that celebrate the scholarship that takes place here."

Eventually, like museums, Ohio State may create a shop -- either located someplace like the Main Library or perhaps online -- where these "evergreen" products could be sold.

Meanwhile, Van Brimmer will continue to research what kinds of images will appeal to consumers. "We're going to do a research project in January to survey manufacturers and retailers to ask, specifically, what they would be interested in," he said, and stumbled onto a sports analogy to express his hopes for the artwork: "We hope to hit a homerun with at least one of these image collections."