The Year Past, The
Year Ahead
By
Michael V. Martin
"I like the dreams of the
future better than the history of the past." - Thomas Jefferson
At the completion of my first year
as president of
First, it has been a genuinely
rewarding experience to serve NMSU and to serve with the outstanding faculty,
staff, and students that are the heart of this fine institution. Much of my
first year has been focused on learning about NMSU and the state of
- This is a very good university,
thanks to the talents and dedication of the faculty and staff.
- We have a real opportunity with a
few changes and investments to get much better.
- We are a remarkably successful,
educational value-added university. We take in students from widely varied
backgrounds, and those who graduate from NMSU are uniformly well educated and
strongly motivated.
- Still, we must improve
significantly our recruiting and retention rates.
- Across the state and in
- Despite the quality of faculty,
staff, programs, and students, we have not established the national or
international reputation and recognition we deserve.
- A multiplicity of forces, both
endogenous and exogenous, will demand that we change, respond, and grow.
Along with the ongoing guided
education I have received, I have attempted to launch and support several
initiatives over the past year.
Here is a short summary.
One University - under this banner
we have:
- Clustered our research efforts.
- Unified our approach to federal
and state relations.
- Established a more aggressive and
engaged approach to promoting economic development locally and statewide.
- Moved toward more coordinated
university communications, in part, to support the "branding
initiative."
- Begun implementation of a new
approach to budgeting for both academic departments and support units.
- Set the groundwork for a systemwide facility and infrastructure master plan.
- Continued progress on a number of
building and facilities restoration projects.
- Positioned the university
for its first comprehensive fund-raising campaign.
- Worked to fully integrate and
fully value our community colleges as part of the NMSU system.
- Continually sought to keep our
focus on outputs, performance, and service first and inputs second.
- Sought ways to make administrative
and support services more efficient and effective.
Budget Allocations
This past year we received a modest
amount of enrollment growth money.
We allocated it to several areas of
need:
- Faculty and staff salaries.
- Health care benefits for those
earning less than $30,000.
- Graduate studies.
- Distance education.
- The
- Recruiting and retention under the
Vice President for Student Services.
Thanks to the generosity of Mr. Stan
Fulton, we have established endowments to support professorships in the
In the
Holders of these new chairs should
be appointed later this year.
We also changed the method of
allocating indirect costs recovered funds (Federal facilities and
administrative cost reimbursement) to encourage and support the research
clusters.
The overarching objective, as you
know, is to build centers of excellence that will (a) enhance our reputation
and ranking, (b) strengthen and focus our service to the people of
In the
Other Initiatives
2004 opening of NMSU's uptown
In March 2005,
The first J. Paul Taylor Symposium on
Social Justice was held this spring. The theme for the symposium, expected to
become an annual event at NMSU, was justice for young people.
Also in the spring, the new
President's Council on Native American Relations (PCNAR) was announced. I hope
the council, under the leadership of Butch Blazer, will provide a better
understanding of the diverse roles of Native Americans in
Students opting for degrees in
hotel, restaurant and tourism management will benefit from enriched curriculum,
more educational resources and greater industry prestige upon graduation now
that the Hotel, Restaurant and Tourism Management Department has been upgraded
to a school.
Students majoring in HRTM will
benefit from the combined resources of the
Challenging Times
Unfortunately, this year has not
come without some sadness for our NMSU family. We lost several members as the
result of natural causes and some tragic actions.
In the wake of the deaths of two
NMSU students, we determined that it was time to take the issue of alcohol
abuse to the community to raise awareness about the scope of the problem and to
engage the community in a discussion about how to reduce such abuse. We held a
forum that brought the university together with officials from the city, the
county, and the state, family and friends of the victims of alcohol abuse, and
students aware of the alcohol scene on campus. It set the stage for future
efforts to assist our students in making smart choices.
Athletics
It was not in my plan to become
directly involved in intercollegiate athletics early in my tenure at NMSU.
However, our decision to join the Western Athletic Conference (WAC) brought
with it a commitment to raise the bar both academically and competitively.
Thus, we have made several changes intended to ensure the success of our
student athletes, create excitement around Aggie sports and significantly
improve the revenue side of athletics so as to make our programs fiscally
self-supporting.
Thanks to the good work of many, I
believe we are on the right path.
The Year Ahead
As we embark on my second year as
president, many of the initiatives from the past year will continue on the
long-term agenda. There are, however, a few issues that will receive special
attention. We will, of course, make our "
We will likely reconsider and
restructure our approach to government relations. The world of federal funding
is changing, and we'll have to change in response.
Likewise, we may do some modest
reorganization of central administration roles and functions to achieve more
effective service to faculty, staff, students, and constituents.
We remain committed, over the coming
years, to improving economic welfare for faculty, staff, and graduate
assistants. Our commitment also is strong to undergraduate activities,
particularly workstudy and other financial aid
programs. While we will look to the Legislature for assistance in this regard,
real progress will require internal adjustments and reallocations. The coming
year will see significant new construction and facilities renovations on
campus. While this will cause some displacement, it will also greatly improve
our campus infrastructure and the ways it serves our mission.
In all we do, we will remain focused
on our core values of excellence, diversity, and global participation.
Let me add one sidebar observation.
There has been a lot of local buzz about mascots, logos, symbols, and the like.
I know that those who weigh in are sincerely concerned so I don't want to
trivialize their input.
However, there are substantial
matters that should occupy our time, talents, and energies. We'll leave
decisions about symbols of all kinds to the professionals who understand how to
best design and utilize them.
The rest of us will work to build
the kind of university that transcends symbolism and establishes NMSU, and any
logo, as an internationally recognized premier land-grant institution.
Summary
All in all, I have enjoyed my first
year as an Aggie. The support and encouragement I have received from our
excellent Board of Regents, faculty, staff, colleagues, student leaders,
alumni, friends, leaders in the Legislature, our Congressional delegation,
folks in the local community, and my fellow New Mexico university presidents
has been both remarkable and appreciated.
My wife, Jan, and I are proud to be
part of the "Aggie Nation." There are exciting days ahead for New