• I am writing today to inform you of the recommendation I intend to make to the UO Board of Trustees regarding tuition rates and mandatory student fees for the upcoming academic year. Since my last message on the topic, I have had the chance to hear directly from students at an open forum, read all 108 messages submitted via the online feedback form, and talked with representatives from a variety of campus stakeholder groups.
• In the month or so since we last communicated with campus about the university’s response to the novel coronavirus known as COVID-19, we have seen the outbreak spread beyond China’s Hubei Province, where it was first detected. The situation is changing day-by-day, but as of this writing, COVID-19 has now been discovered in at least 50 countries, including the United States. This may sound like a scary set of facts, but I want to assure you that the UO is doing everything we can to be prepared.
• I have received recommendations from the students, faculty, and staff who comprise the Tuition and Fee Advisory Board (TFAB) and am now ready to receive campus input on an innovative guaranteed tuition model for undergraduates that deserves serious consideration. This tuition plan is a change from past practices, and I encourage the campus community to look closely at the new tuition model proposed by TFAB. I am strongly inclined to support the guaranteed tuition concept because it addresses a persistent challenge within higher education and provides real benefits to both current and future University of Oregon students.
• Conversations I regularly have with students, faculty, staff, donors, and community members often go one of two very different ways. The vast majority of conversations are incredibly positive and optimistic. They are about the excitement of opening the Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact, hiring new faculty and academic advisors, opening new buildings and residence halls, celebrating the football team’s Rose Bowl win, or making programmatic investments in prevention science, environmental humanities, data analytics, and more. They focus on this transformational time for the university and its bright future.
• Next week the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments about whether to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. This is important to the University of Oregon because for students on our campus, and at other universities across the country, DACA helps provide a path to higher education and a better life.
• A few weeks ago, UO’s new Provost Patrick Phillips and I took a walk around campus and talked about some of the things we are both looking forward to at the start of a new academic year.
• I am delighted to welcome all of you—students, faculty, and staff—to fall term at the University of Oregon. The start of an academic year always holds the promise of renewal and a fresh start, of making discoveries and insights, creating and re-establishing meaningful connections and friendships, and charting a new course for excellence and success.
• This fall the University of Oregon will proudly open the new Black Cultural Center on our campus. It will be a home base for academic and social activities of Black students and a place where other students and visitors can learn about the Black student experience and history at the UO through exhibits and programs. Creation of the center came out of the demands of the Black Student Task Force, seeking to make the university a more inclusive, equitable, and diverse place. A center of such distinction requires a name that reflects the important mission it will embody.
• I am pleased to announce that Biology Professor Patrick Phillips will be the UO’s next provost and senior vice president. From a pool of tremendously strong internal candidates, Patrick emerged as the next provost due to his nearly two decades of distinguished service as one of the UO’s most respected faculty members, a track record of success as an administrative leader, and clear vision for what it will take for this institution to achieve new levels of academic excellence and distinction. Patrick will begin his term July 1.
• Over the last week, I have received in-person and online input from students and other campus stakeholders on the 2019–20 resident undergraduate tuition recommendation from the Tuition and Fee Advisory Board (TFAB). I greatly appreciated hearing from students at the open forum, and I want to thank everyone who invested the time to share their point of view.