FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Kathie Dibell570-577-3260 office570-322-2203 home[email protected]
Bucknell's President Proposes 10-Year Plan for University at Inauguration
LEWISBURG, Pa, Oct. 29. -- Steffen H. Rogers, inaugurated Sunday as Bucknell's 15th president, called for a "Vision 2010" plan to ensure that the university builds on the traditions of excellence that his 14 predecessors have established.
"I am proposing that the entire university community work together to create a new programmatic plan for Bucknell, Vision 2010 (that) will be our blueprint for the next 10 years," Rogers said, adding that the plan should be a "shared vision, a feasible vision, a financially sound vision, and an exceptional vision for the education and future of our students."
The new president's inaugural speech was titled, "Bucknell University: Honoring the Past, Celebrating the Future," and he looked back at the university's 154-year history for insight into the future.
Rogers said that in researching Bucknell history and archives, "The strongest tradition that I could find … has been that of a complete and total commitment to liberally educate each and every student."
He quoted acting President Stephen W. Taylor (1846-1851) who said that a university that seeks to train students "exclusively for a single trade or profession, ill prepares them for usefulness in active life."
Rogers noted, "Tomorrow's leaders will be men and women who have a strong grounding in basic disciplines, but who are also nimble and enterprising and hold a global view … precisely because we have remained true to Stephen Taylor's vision … Bucknell University is poised to seize the initiative in the Internet Age."
As the new century dawns, he said, "change hurtles toward us with breathtaking speed. We have heard it said that the world is racing along an electronic highway with no speed limits. Technology isn't just scaling walls, it's dissolving them. In the Web world the meetings of minds, the clash of competition in global markets and the interaction of people and progress bring challenges and opportunities beyond anything our founders ever dreamed."
The portraits of the previous 14 Bucknell president hang in the corridors leading to Rogers' office. "When I listen closely," he said, "I can hear their voices saying to me, 'We did our part; we have handed you an excellent university; now it is up to you to make it better.'"
Rogers, 59, came to Bucknell from Clemson where he had been vice president for academic affairs and provost since 1996 and had served as Clemson's acting president for several months in 1997-1998 and again in the fall of 1999. He also was a professor of biology.
D. Lee Hamilton, chairman of the Presidential Search Committee, introduced Rogers to the inaugural crowd, saying that the new president was a "special" person with "impeccable academic and administrative credentials" who brings to the university "an innate combination of being a highly skilled administrator and manager while, at the same time, being a sincerely interested-in-people person."
More than 1,000 attended the inauguration ceremonies in the Gerhard Fieldhouse, including three former Bucknell presidents, Dennis O'Brien (1976-1984), Gary A. Sojka (1984-1995) and William D. Adams (1995-2000). O'Brien retired after serving as president of the University of Rochester. Sojka remains at Bucknell as a professor of biology. Adams is president of Colby.
The two-hour ceremony featured greetings from representatives of the faculty, administration, trustees, students, alumni, parents and the Lewisburg community. Cynthia Hogue, director of the Stadler Center for Poetry, read a poem she penned for the occasion. The Bucknell Orchestra, the Bucknell Symphonic Band and the Rooke Chapel Choir and the Rooke Chapel Ringers all performed.
Rogers said that Vision 2010 should:
o emphasize the liberal arts, but also include a plan to build a separate, but not separated image, for programs in engineering, management and education.
o continue the long-standing tradition of the teacher/scholar by recruiting and retaining exceptional faculty.
o create additional areas of excellence in which Bucknell can be nationally prominent.
o promote Bucknell nationally and internationally to achieve an even higher reputation as one of the top-tier liberal arts universities.
o provide access to all qualified students through financial aid
o increase minority student enrollment and recruit minority and women faculty and staff to serve as role models.
o provide a balanced social life for students, integrating academic programs with student activities, with programming for Greek and non-Greek students.
o increase the current $473 endowment to $1 billion.
o review the athletic program to ensure gender equity, provide recreational opportunities for all students and strengthen intramural programs while continuing to be highly competitive in varsity sports and leading the nation in the graduation rate of student-athletes.
o strengthen community relationships.
o include a commitment to bring all students living in town back to campus by 2010 (some 420 of the 3,350 students now live off-campus).
"We cannot afford to rest on our laurels," Rogers said. "The greatest roadblock to progress can be summed up in two words, status quo."
Although Bucknell has already proved that it is a leader among top-tier universities, Rogers said, "Vision 2010 will ensure that Bucknell will be different, yet the same; better in many ways, but with the same rich traditions; renewed, rethought and even restructured to address and challenge another new decade, another generation of Bucknellians, but it will easily be recognizable as the Bucknell University we now love.
"We will find strength in the quality of our faculty and students, as we always have. We will rank amongst the very best liberal arts universities in the country. We will celebrate our unique position in higher education. We will provide an exceptional education for our students."
And when the 16th president is inaugurated, Rogers said, he wants he or she to hear Rogers' voice added to his 14 predecessors', saying, "I did my part; I've handed you a great university; now it's up to you to make it even better."
Before going to Clemson, Rogers was dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Rhode Island and acting dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tulsa. In 1964, he graduated from Georgia Southern College where he met his wife, Athena. He earned his Ph.D. in biology from Vanderbilt in 1968 and held a postdoctoral position in pathobiology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health.
Bucknell has some 3,350 undergraduates enrolled in the College of Arts and Sciences and the College of Engineering.
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(NOTE: The text of President Rogers' speech is available upon request by contacting Kathie Dibell, 570-577-3260, [email protected]).
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