University at Buffalo - The State University of New York

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  “Those funds are competitive, and we’re asking people for their best ideas on how they can use these funds to move us up in the ranks of AAU institutions.”

  Interim Provost Harvey G. Stenger Jr.

By SUE WUETCHER

Published: October 6, 2011

The rationale tuition policy recently adopted by SUNY and implemented by UB will allow the university to add 300 net new faculty members over the next five years and help it rise in the ranks of AAU universities, Interim Provost Harvey G. Stenger Jr. told members of the UB Council at Monday’s council meeting.

The policy, which will increase tuition revenues by 5-6 percent each year for in-state undergraduates and 9-10 percent for out-of-state students, will provide the funds to increase the number of faculty at the university from 1,300 to 1,600, Stenger reported.

Moreover, with another 300 faculty expected to retire or leave the university for other reasons during that period, UB actually will end up bringing 600 new faculty members on board, he added.

Hiring will be done across all fields, Stenger said, with a focus on the strategic strength areas, among them health and wellness, extreme events, integrated nanostructured systems, and civic engagement and public policy.

He noted that 80 new faculty members joined the university this fall, with hires being made in every school and at all ranks.

In response to a question from council member June Hoeflich, Stenger noted that UB’s current student-to-faculty ratio is about 23:1, and that the hiring plan would bring that ratio down to 18:1, in line with the median ratio at other public institutions in the Association of American Universities, a group encompassing the 61 leading research universities in North America. UB has been a member of AAU since 1989.

Lowering the ratio “is going to help everything almost automatically,” he said. “More classes will be offered, more sections of classes, more research will be done, students will graduate on time, more publications will get out.”

Stenger explained that as UB’s budget increases with these tuition revenues, the question becomes: Where does the university invest these resources?

He said a planning process currently is under way in which the deans will put together their own three-year hiring plans.

About 75 percent of the increased tuition revenues will be spent on new faculty, Stenger said, with the remainder being put aside in what he called the “three E fund,” named after President Satish K. Tripathi’s three areas of focus: excellence, efficiency and engagement.

“Those funds are competitive, and we’re asking people for their best ideas on how they can use these funds to move us up in the ranks of AAU institutions,” Stenger said.

As of last weekend, he said he had received 85 such proposals from all across the university. In the next two months, administrators will take those proposals, as well as the deans’ hiring plans, to determine how to distribute the “three E” funds.

UB is trying to increase its key performance indicators against the AAU median, he said, noting that the majority of these are categorized under research productivity—research expenditures, publications and faculty awards. Other indicators are student quality—as measured by SAT and GRE scores, high school GPA and academic experience while at UB—and fundraising.

In response to a question about standards for the AAU, President Satish K. Tripathi pointed out that while UB resides in the lower portion of the AAU ranks, it remains among the top 60 research institutions in the country.

He cited the major criteria for admission to—and retention in—the AAU: federal funding for faculty, the number of faculty members who are members of the national academies, citations of faculty research and other national awards won by faculty.

“This is all really about research,” Tripathi said.

In other business, Michael Cain, vice president for health sciences and dean of the School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, updated council members on the planned move of the medical school to the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus.

Cain said the preferred site for the relocated school is in the area of Main and High streets, near the Allen Street subway station. UB currently is working with the SUNY Construction Fund on land appraisal and acquisition, he said.

The cost of the first phase of the project—which would cover approximately 70-75 percent of the space needs of the medical school—is $375 million, Cain said. UB would pay cash for the first $160 million, using funds from the NY SUNY 2020 Challenge Grant program, funds that were to be used to renovate the current South Campus home of the medical school, gifts for the school garnered through development efforts and current reserves of the medical school.

The remaining $215 million, Cain said, would be borrowed and the debt paid back over 30 years through increased revenues that would come to the school through the build-out of the UBMD physicians practice plan, expansion in the clinical departments, an increase in research revenue generated by the high-profile faculty UB is now able to recruit and retain “because of excitement about the overall build-out of the project” and plans for continued growth through philanthropy.

The time schedule, he said, would begin with land acquisition by spring 2012, with phase 1 design to begin in May 2012 and completed in April 2013. Construction would begin in September 2013 and be completed by August 2016.

“The goal is to be able to welcome the new entering class in the new school when they begin in the late summer, early fall of 2016,” he said.

The council on Monday also unanimously approved naming resolutions:

• Establishing the Edward W. Michael Wrestling Complex in honor of Edward Michael, UB wrestling coach for 21 years and one of the only coaches in UB history to take a team of any sport to a national championship (1978 NCAA Division III wrestling championship)
• Establishing the Jeff Parker Student-Athlete Lounge in the Edward W. Michael Wrestling Complex in honor of the late Jeffrey D. Parker, BA ’08, a former UB wrestling captain, vice present of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee and recipient of a SUNY Chancellor’s Scholar-Athlete Award.
• Establishing the Edward and Candice Tyrrell Wrestling Head Coach’s Office in the Wright wrestling complex. Edward Tyrrell, MBA ’81 & BS 79, was a member of the 1978 national wrestling championship team and has been inducted into the Dr. and Mrs. Edmond J. Gicewicz Family UB Athletics Hall of Fame.