DATE: March 20, 2001

TO: Board of Regents

FROM: Geoffrey Gamble, President, MSU-Bozeman

RE:  Campus Report for the March, 2001 Board of Regents Meeting

1.       Status of Key Administrative Searches

The committee charged with finding a new Dean of the College of Engineering is in the final stages of its work. Finalists for the position are: Kynric Pell, former Dean of Engineering at the University of Wyoming; James Peterson, Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Programs in the College of Engineering at Washington state University; Dennis Horn, Dean of Engineering at Gonzaga University; and Steven Abt, Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Programs in the College of Engineering at Colorado State University. Vice Provost Joe Fedock is chairing the search.

The Search Committee for the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs is, according to committee chair Bruce McLeod, Dean of Graduate Studies, nearing the single digit stage. Sixty plus applications were received and campus interviews are slated to begin in mid to late April and wrap up prior to commencement, which is on May 12.

2.       The Final Report of the Recruitment and Retention Task Force has been presented to President Gamble and can be accessed at the Reports Page on the MSU Web site, www.montana.edu/airc/report/. The report uses cost benefit approach to reviewing programs and services that can help the campus achieve an appropriate number and mix of students. Vice Provost Pamela Hill and Director of New student Services Ronda Russell co-chaired the Task Force.

3.       If you missed CBSs Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn on March 13, you missed a chance to see an audience entirely made up of MSU alumni and friends who were invited by Kilborn, a 1990 graduate from the Film and Television program (now Media and Theater Arts). He was as excited to have fellow Bobcats in the audience as they were to be there. He waived a school pennant, sang the fight song, was emphatic about his choice of institutions and remarked that as a Bobcat basketball player, he once led the Big Sky Conference in turnovers.

4.       The campus has initiated a major restructuring of its planning and budgeting efforts. In an address to the campus on March 1, President Gamble outlined the new process that will see the budget being guided by the work of the Long Range Plan, driven by data, judged by business principles and built by the newly created 21 member University Planning, Budgeting and Analysis Committee (UPBAC). The committee's charge is to deliver a proposal for a balanced budget to the President's desk by May 21. Details of the plan can be viewed at https://www.montana.edu/president/. 

5.       EPSCoR Infrastructure Grant Funded

The Montana University System's most recent proposal to the National Science Foundation EPSCoR Program has been funded at a total of $13.5 million, including state match, over three years. This newest project focuses on enhancing research activities in the MUS that improve the state's science and technology infrastructure that, in turn, can contribute to the state's growing high-tech economy. Key to the proposal is developing integrated and complementary research programs at MSU and UM. Increasing the quality and number of graduate students; expanding the involvement of undergraduates in research; increasing the representation of underrepresented groups, especially Native Americans, through education and outreach programs with the tribal colleges, are among the overall objectives of this significant program.

6.       Two MSU Skiers earned All-America honors at the recent NCAA Championships in Middlebury, VT. Freshman Maria Kalnaes placed tenth in the 15-kilometer freestyle race and Marianne Magnus, also a freshman finished fifth overall in the women's five-kilometer classic race. Both are from Oslo, Norway. At the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships in Fayetteville, AR, MSU Pole-vaulter Shannon Agee, a junior from Helena, set a new school and Big Sky Conference record clearing 13-feet, 1.5-inches to place tenth and earn All-America honors.