University of Illinois

President // Speeches and Statements

GLOBAL CAMPUS OP-ED APPEARING IN THE NEWS-GAZETTE
B. Joseph White, President
January 7, 2007  

Decision time for Global Campus

On campus and in the pages of the News-Gazette, the University and the community have been having a spirited discussion about the Global Campus initiative. Our goal is to deliver high-quality, affordable online education to thousands of able and motivated students whose personal circumstances don’t allow them to join us on campus for some or all of their education.

Jared Perry, the young serviceman I introduced at my inaugural address, is such a person. He continued his U of I education online from Baghdad – and later graduated – when his National Guard unit was called to serve. But he was a rare exception since we offer few online undergraduate courses.

The Global Campus team has spent part of the last year and $1 million studying and planning how to deliver the rich mix of online and in-person education of the future. We have an opportunity not only to be the national leader in online education but also to develop new approaches to learning that will enliven our traditional classrooms.

It is time to come together on a final, unified plan. We cannot afford to fail.

That’s because today 85 percent of American students graduate from high school, but only 30 percent earn a college degree. This massive education gap is thwarting achievement of individual dreams, damaging the economy and impairing America’s global competitiveness.

The proposed expansion of our educational outreach has elicited agreement on the part of many faculty and staff. They accept the moral imperative of our land-grant mission to bring high quality, accessible, affordable education to thousands of additional students. They also understand the vital need for a major new revenue source that will generate a surplus to help our three campuses achieve their aspirations.

The most important financial need that Global Campus can help us meet is providing competitive salaries and support to ensure our faculty stay and thrive here, and aren’t poached by other universities eager to improve themselves and move up in the national rankings. This is important at a time when we cannot count on much in increased state support, and raising tuition by the amount we need would seriously threaten student access and affordability.

Our faculty’s success in attracting research grants and contracts will continue to help us financially, as will success in our upcoming fund-raising campaign. But we absolutely need the major new revenue and surplus Global Campus can generate.

Some faculty have expressed concerns about the organizational form of Global Campus. We are flexible on this matter as long as the chosen form is compatible with success of the enterprise. With regard to quality, we envision a master-teacher model of instruction in which tenured faculty lead instructional teams of supplemental faculty, already a familiar approach in many courses at U of I. With respect to possible separate accreditation of the Global Campus, that decision will not be taken for several years and faculty will have a major voice in it.

Some have expressed concern about the risk in launching Global Campus, and there is risk. But a risk-free path is not available to the University of Illinois. Not launching Global Campus in some form would mean, to a degree, failing not only in our mission but also in mastering online education and securing the money we need to achieve excellence. We are, as I said in my inaugural address, at a tipping point. In one direction is serious risk of a slow slide to mediocrity which is unacceptable for U of I; in the other is the opportunity (though not a guarantee) to create a brilliant future.

Now the time of decision approaches.

On January 8, I am convening an important meeting of faculty leaders, deans and the Global Campus planning team. Our goal will be to achieve as much consensus as possible so we can present a unified report from the University community to the Board of Trustees at its January 18 meeting in Chicago.

The process in which we are engaged is shared governance at its best. I am grateful to faculty, staff and students for all the hard work, good thought and sustained engagement they have put into the Global Campus initiative. I am confident that working together, we will make the wisest possible decisions.

B. Joseph White is president of the University of Illinois with its campuses in Urbana-Champaign, Chicago and Springfield.

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Read the News-Gazette article entitled "UI Global Campus: Money Well-Spent".