Sally Mason Q&A: transparency, stimulus
DI: As president of a large university, what attempts do you make to be transparent about decisions with faculty, staff, and students?
Mason: I have a lot of conversations with them. I’m a big believer, much as our provost is, that if you can sit down and have face-to-face conversations and ask unanswered questions, then it’s a great thing. … The budget and flood are the two things that are keeping us fully occupied in terms of questions and answers. … We put a website up on the budget, so we’re trying to mirror what we did with the flood this past summer and have questions and answers, have information as we get it, out there on that website so everyone can see what we’re trying to do and the conversations we’re having.
DI: How do you feel about the educational aspects of the federal stimulus bill? Are there any specifics you were excited to see included?
Mason: We hope, obviously, that as the federal stimulus package dollars become clearer, and [government officials] understand obviously how much they can do with it, that they keep us in mind for help with the federal stimulus package. And we’re looking at a lot of different aspects of the stimulus package that I think are important. There is the operational piece that obviously could help us with some of the budget cuts that we are currently facing. Now I think that the thing people have to remember is that we have to make budget cuts. We do. Because this [stimulus] money is two-year money. What it will allow us to do is to make thoughtful decisions about how to manage our budget going forward. … However quickly we might be able to get it done would be very different from how we might thoughtfully proceed with budget cuts given enough time to plan for them. … There are pieces of the stimulus, though, that we are poised and anxious to take advantage of, including the $10.4 billion that the [National Institutes of Health] has received, and the $3.8 billion that the [National Institute of Science] has received, because we obviously have many researchers here who receive dollars from the NIH and NIS. They are anxious, and poised, and ready to put their ideas out there for funding opportunities.
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DI: The stimulus plan, as well as some discussion over the budget, has focused on research- and grant-based programs. What are we doing at the UI to make sure certain departments — such as some in liberal arts — are not forgotten?
Mason: It’s different research. I think it’s not correct to think they’re not research oriented — they are. Every piece of creative work that comes out of our arts department, of our English department, our Writers’ Workshop … the arts and culture pieces are a really important piece, and I think we shouldn’t lose sight of that. The fact that we were named a UNESCO City of Literature — the only one on this continent, and only one of three cities in the world to have that designation — says a lot of the product. … We would not have been able to be competitive for such a designation if it were not for the fact that some of the best people in the world when it comes to arts and literature come through Iowa City. … They do it because they know they will come here and find people that have similar interests and similar passions for the arts here in Iowa City. I think our students benefit from it.
DI: You have said there will be a certificate in sustainability studies next year. What sort of initiatives are being made in terms of sustainability?
Mason: Part of the whole sustainability initiative was five new positions for faculty doing interdisciplinary work in sustainability, and we’re trying to hold on to those as well. You want to be able to say, when all of this is over, we have really good plans moving forward for what we want this university to be. And we have said we want this university to be more sustainable, a more environmentally responsible university. And we’ve said that should start both in the operations … but it should extend all the way through the curriculum and into the faculty. … Our students have embraced it, our faculty have embraced it. So preserving this going forward is important. We’re not going to give up on emerging programs that can become excellent. We’re not going to give up on those programs that are excellent. We want to make sure that they stay strong.
