December 2007 Issue

December 2007 Issue

Around Campus

Academic Year Open with Address by Paul Farmer

Austin College officially began its 159th academic year Sept. 3 with an Opening Convocation address by Paul Farmer, physician, Harvard Medical School professor, and global humanitarian who received the 2007 Austin College Leadership Award in March.

While still in college, Farmer traveled to rural Haiti to assist those providing health care to the poor and sick. In 1987, Farmer co-founded the charity organization Partners In Health; 20 years later, the organization serves some of the world’s sickest and poorest on four continents, providing schools, clinics, and training programs for health outreach workers. Farmer has received numerous awards and honors for his continued service and advocacy on behalf of the poor, sick, and disenfranchised.

“The path I embarked on has brought me great satisfaction — and was opened up to me by a liberal arts education,” said Farmer, a Duke University graduate, as he spoke to a large crowd in Wynne Chapel, including the entering Class of 2011, the Class of 2008 beginning their final year of college, faculty, staff, and guests.

Farmer spoke to students about recognizing the opportunities offered them through a liberal arts education, pursuing leadership characterized by service, and understanding the need to read and think critically in order to make informed and responsible decisions as citizens.

Farmer reminded students that to attend a school such as Austin College and experience a liberal arts education is to live “on an island of privilege.” Farmer, who had traveled from rural Haiti the day before, expressed his hope that, in realizing their privilege, students would savor the opportunities before them. “In the eyes of six billion people who live on this planet, this is unheard-of good fortune,” he said, speaking of the poor individuals he serves in his work around the U.S. and the world.

Urging students not to rush into a particular career or area of study, Farmer encouraged students to take advantage of the liberal arts to broaden themselves, to explore new areas of study or service, and to “find something you can be passionate about for a long, long time.” 

Farmer recommended that all students embrace the spirit of service leadership espoused at Austin College and seek ways in which they can serve others. “I’ve never heard someone come to the end of life and say ‘I wish I’d done less for others,’” he said. “In every profession in the world, you can find ways to use the skills in which you are trained to be of service to others.”

Referencing our electronic age, Farmer said much information is available in the world, but not all of it is true. “We’re lucky we still have democracy here,” Farmer. “I am quite concerned about democracy and we have to preserve that,” he added, explaining that it takes critical analysis to sift through the barrage of information to find facts and know how to use them.

“People who have liberal arts educations, who learn about their world, and who think about service to others are the ones who are going to make democracy better,” said Farmer. “That would be my deepest aspiration for the students of the classes of 2008 and 2011.”

Farmer was selected for the Austin College Leadership Award for his work promoting healthcare and human rights for the world’s poorest citizens in places like Haiti, Peru, Guatemala, Mexico, Russia, Rwanda, Malawi and Lesotho. Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World, by New York Times best-selling author Tracy Kidder, was assigned as a common read for the freshman class. 

 “Dr. Farmer’s efforts to transform healthcare on a global scale by championing the cause of some of the world’s poorest and least-heard individuals truly show his commitment to serve as a responsible and active member of the global community,” said Oscar C. Page, president of Austin College. 

• Watch the video clip on YouTube

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Class of 2011 Includes 340 New College Students

A record number of admission applications — more than 1,730 — resulted in an Austin College Class of 2011 enrollment of 340 first-time college students.

The group, 52 percent female and 48 percent male, includes students from 17 states and five countries. The 316 students from Texas come from all regions of the state.

The Class of 2011 included eight National Merit Scholars, one National Hispanic Scholar, and one National Achievement Scholarship recipient. The middle 50 percent of the Class of 2011 earned combined SAT scores of 1140-1310.  Of the students whose schools do ranking, 73 percent ranked in the top 25 percent of their class.

The fall 2007 overall student body of 1,339 students includes 35 transfer students new to Austin College and 33 students spending the fall term abroad.

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New Campus Emergency Notification System in Place

The tragic shootings at Virginia Tech in April 2007 have caused college campuses all across the country to review their emergency response systems, and many institutions have begun to implement new alert systems as a result. Tim Millerick, vice president for Student Affairs and Athletics, has been in charge of a similar effort at Austin College, where he also oversees the Crisis and Emergency Response Team.

In the event of a campus emergency, a new off-site Web-based alert system provided by Connect-ED will immediately contact all Austin College students, parents, faculty, and staff with important updates. Drawing on information from the College’s database, up to nine contacts will be made for each person, using relevant telephone numbers, text message addresses, and email addresses.

 "Austin College has reviewed its safety policies and procedures, and will continue to do so" Millerick said, "and it will be extremely important for students and their families to keep us well informed with up-to-date contact information." He noted that the College has been vigilant in its efforts to collect personal and parent contact information from students throughout the fall for its new emergency alert system.

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	Enlightenment: Dick Lentz

In announcing Austin College’s beautiful new Grand Avenue entrance, the Sandra J. Williams Founders Plaza, in the June issue of Austin College Magazine, the name of one of the creators of the area was given incorrectly. Richard “Dick” Lentz of Lentz Lighting in Dallas handled the illumination work on the fountains and plaza. He is a 1976 graduate of Austin College.  

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Austin College Is Part of New Initiative
to Improve College Search Process

In conjunction with a nationwide effort to provide comprehensive and transparent information to prospective college students and their families, Austin College was part of the launch of the University and College Accountability Network, or U-CAN, in September. This free, Web-based consumer resource is intended to provide objective and measurable data outside of a ranking or survey setting.

U-CAN is the effort of the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities (NAICU), comprised of nearly 1,000 member institutions across the country.  The impetus for this landmark effort grew in part out of on-going concerns about the objectivity of commercial rankings, such as the U.S. News & World Report “Best Colleges” survey, as well as the public’s growing interest in accessible and standardized data to make informed decisions about college choice. 

Oscar C. Page, president of Austin College, insists that U-CAN “is not intended to be a substitute for commercial rankings, which are based on a subjective weighting system.” Rather, he said, “U-CAN will help students and their families by providing accurate and comparable information about colleges and universities in a standard format. Finding the best college fit is critical to a student’s educational success, and we believe the U-CAN system will help immensely in the college search process.”

Participating schools provide campus data, Web links, and narrative descriptions in uniform two-page profiles that provide information on a range of characteristics, from tuition costs and graduation rates, to class size and campus safety. 

The links and narrative descriptions complement each profile’s statistical data, providing specific information on key aspects of each college and university. “Key elements of the selection process are intangible, such as a college’s unique mission and campus ethos,” said Nan M. Davis, vice president for Institutional Enrollment at Austin College. “And there can be little replacement for the campus visit during the search process,” she emphasized, “which offers a preview of what four years at a particular college will be like. Few decisions in life will prove more important than selecting a college,” she added, “particularly given the way in which the college experience—from both an academic and a social sense—opens pathways that have lasting impacts.”

In addition to viewing profiles for specific campuses all in one place, prospective students will be able to use a search feature on the U-CAN site to compare schools based on a variety of institutional subsets. Campus statistics are drawn from information annually reported by colleges and universities as part of the Common Data Set and the U.S. Department of Education’s Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS).

The U-CAN project has been a year in the making. A free service, the U-CAN site will not include advertisements or sponsorships. Similar ventures for the nation’s public colleges and universities are underway by other not-for-profit organizations.

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International Service Fellowship Established at Austin College

Austin College students pursuing summer international service projects and non-profit internships toward community development efforts will have a new source for potential funding assistance through the College’s Global Outreach “GO” Fellowship Program. Created through a grant from the Todd and Abby Williams Family Foundation of Dallas, the program aims “to cultivate the next generation of local, national, and global leaders by promoting innovative, experiential servant leadership opportunities around the world,” according to application materials. The program’s steering committee will select 10 to 15 recipients annually, with the first awards for summer 2008 projects.

“There are few things more inspiring than young students who want to change the world and have both the energy and the sincere conviction that they can,” said Todd Williams ’82 and trustee. “Abby and I feel that it is so important to help students who are clearly passionate about helping others. We both want Austin College to be well-recognized nationally for the quality and the intellectual breadth of the servant leaders it produces. It’s our sincere hope that this program, along with the many other aspects of global learning already featured on campus, can help make that goal even more of a reality.”  

Approximately 70 percent of Austin College students participate in international study during their college experience, which placed the College first in the nation among baccalaureate institutions for study abroad participation by the Institute of International Education’s 2006 “Open Doors” report.

A significant number of Austin College students participate in service projects and outreach through the campus Service Station and other student organizations. The new fellowships will allow students to combine the elements of servant leadership and international awareness.

Students receiving the Global Outreach Fellowships will be expected to share their experiences with the campus community upon their return. The fellows will complete a reflection course in the academic term following their projects.

Applications for the fellowships are available in the Office of Career Services amd deadline for 2008 awards is March 1. Members of the Global Outreach Fellowship Steering Committee, which will review applications, are Austin College faculty and staff Peter DeLisle, director of the Posey Leadership Institute; John Williams, chaplain; Julie Hempel, assistant professor of Spanish; and Viki Reeder, internship coordinator and assistant director of Career Services; student Will Radke ’08; and donors Todd Williams, partner, Goldman Sachs; and Abby Williams, chair of the Williams Preparatory School of Dallas. 

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New Alumni Relations Director Named

Victoria Martinsen has been named Austin College director of alumni and parent relations, joining the Institutional Advancement team in late October. “I am delighted that Victoria has joined us,” said Jim Lewis, vice president for Institutional Advancement. “Through the search process, we found Victoria to be someone who thinks outside the box, is very analytical, has an intuition for developing creative programs, and has excellent people skills in relating to both volunteers and campus colleagues. I believe she will be a fine asset to Austin College.” 

Martinsen came to Austin College from Scripps College, a women’s liberal arts college in Claremont, Calif., where she was the associate director of alumnae relations for the past five years. She has an undergraduate degree in theatre from Scripps and a master’s degree in arts management from Carnegie Mellon University. Prior to working at Scripps, she worked for a number of years with the Walt Disney Company.

“I am thrilled to be the new director of Alumni and Parent relations at Austin College, Martinsen said. “I look forward to working with the staff, students, faculty, and volunteers to take a good program and make it even better. My hope is to engage as many alumni and parents as possible in myriad ways through five program areas: on-campus programs such as Homecoming and family weekend, regional programs, domestic and international travel program, student-young alumni programs, and online communities. Online communities in particular allow us to stay connected with alumni and parents across the country and around the world, and will become increasingly important in years to come. This is an exciting time in Austin College’s history, and I'm am proud to be a part of it.”

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Students Manage $1 Million Investment Fund

This fall, several Austin College economics and business administration majors are learning security research and asset allocation and valuation in a new course titled Practicum in Portfolio Management that has as its primary objective providing those enrolled with money management experience.  What sets this course apart from similar offerings across the nation is that students are gaining experience by investing in a live portfolio.  

Those involved with the Todd A. Williams Student Managed Investment Fund
are, left to right, Will Radke, Todd Williams, Brittany Causey, Matthew Holzgrafe,
Julia Pfeffer, Nicholas Dahlberg, Geoff Wescott, and Steve Ramsey.

Even more, the portfolio’s opening value is $1 million.

The College’s Todd A. Williams Student Managed Investment Fund was established by Williams, a 1982 graduate of Austin College and partner at Goldman Sachs, to promote investment education and increase funding for scholarships.

“My desire is that this fund will do more than simply enable students to learn about investment as a career,” Williams said. “I hope it also gives them greater confidence to seek opportunities in this field and makes them meaningfully more attractive to potential recruiters,” he added. “Recruiters want students with practical experience who can hit the ground running.”

While the sheer size and nature of the fund are unique, so are the beneficiaries of any profit. The fund has an investment objective of an 8 percent annualized return over a three-year rolling period, with any annual income above the fund’s initial $1 million corpus used to create new endowed scholarships honoring Austin College faculty and staff.

“Since the money we earn through the fund goes toward scholarships,” said Will Radke, a senior international economics and Asian double studies major, “we know our decisions can have an impact on others’ potential to advance intellectually.  This aspect provides more value than a ‘dummy’ account could ever impart.”

Students are responsible for managing the portfolio with supervision from Steve Ramsey, assistant professor of business administration at Austin College.  The students earn course credit for work on the year-long project.

Ramsey has noticed already the difference managing real money makes in the students’ analysis of companies and stock.  “The level of focus and serious research the students are devoting to managing this money is quite impressive,” he said. “With many games that involve ‘play’ money, decisions can be made based on feelings, with little real analysis, because the results don’t impact real finances.”

In the first six weeks, the fund was up more than 6.5 percent ($65,000), Ramsey said.  In September, the students invested in seven companies, with Apple the strongest performer, up 11 percent.

“Investing real money takes a bit of the academic element out of the process and makes it feel more like a job,” said Geoff Wescott, a senior economics and business administration double major. “We are responsible for money that someone else graciously donated; therefore, we feel committed to do our best—and beyond. We want to be the ones who make money for the fund, not lose it.”

Each student is responsible for one or two sectors of the market and makes two presentations a month on companies within those sectors to their professor and peers for investment consideration, Wescott said. Students also submit written reports on the selected companies and provide class reports to the fund’s advisory board. When the fund’s fiscal year ends on March 31, 2008, students will prepare a final report and present it to the advisory board prior to the close of the spring term in May.

“There is no substitute, particularly in business, for making real life decisions that have real consequences,” Williams said. “Sure, mistakes may be made, but that’s how someone learns.  I am confident that involving real, substantive dollars will bring a higher level of student focus and intensity to the decision-making process, precisely because the student team’s investment performance will ultimately impact the number of future students who can receive academic scholarships from the fund’s earnings, a resource that otherwise would not be available.”

While not all the student participants plan to pursue a career on Wall Street, the value of the experience isn’t lost on them. “Honing in on industry and stock analysis is a life-long skill,” Radke said. “Regardless if we are managing our own retirement or do this work professionally, it will pay dividends many times over.”

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College Has Nearly $182 Million Economic Impact on Area Economy

Austin College positively influences many aspects of life in north Texas, offering a nationally recognized liberal arts college that presents cultural opportunities for local citizens, offers campus facilities for community activities, and provides numerous year-round volunteers for area social service agencies. In terms of dollars and cents, the economic impact of the College is equally important.

According to a recently released Economic Impact Statement, Austin College contributed nearly $182 million to the area economy during the 2006–2007 academic year. The exact figure, $181,897,055, was calculated including direct and indirect impact, including salaries, expenditures to local vendors, and spending by visitors to the campus. 

“Austin College has long enjoyed the support of the local community and generous financial contributions from the area,” said Austin College President Oscar C. Page.  “TheEconomic Impact Statement clearly shows the College’s investment in the local community,” Page added. “In the past year, our investment with local vendors increased by more than $2 million. This, plus continued increase in the impact created by students and families, makes Austin College one of the largest participants in the local economy.”

During the 2006–2007 academic year, Austin College’s student population included 1,316 full-time undergraduate students and 33 Master of Arts in Teaching students, who came from 32 states and 27 countries. During this same time, the College employed 328 faculty and staff, paying a total in payroll and benefits of more than $20 million. The College also made expenditures to local vendors in excess of $9.3million. Using a standard employment multiplier formula, the College’s total employment impact translates into the creation of an estimated 3,257 jobs locally.

Additional revenue to the area economy is generated by the students themselves, their parents, and visitors to the many campus events, a total figure estimated to be$21,699,900. Throughout the summer months alone, Austin College hosts more than 5,200 young people and adults in conferences and camps, resulting in expenditures in the local community of $1,077,200.

Data for the Economic Impact Statement were compiled by the Austin College Office of Institutional Research.

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Karen Nelson Named Associate Vice President

Karen Nelson, professor of psychology at Austin College since 1977, considers herself “like a kid in a candy store” in her new position as associate vice president for Institutional Effectiveness.

She is contemplating not glass cases of sugary delights, but data — lots of data — that have been collected and reported on regarding Austin College students, faculty, and programs, and curricula. Nelson looks beyond the numbers to how the College can best use the available data. “I hope to find those things we can celebrate,” she said, giving as an example data that show Austin College seniors report far more experience with internationalization than seniors at peer institutions. She also will look at areas that need attention, national trends that should be examined, and other data that can be helpful to Austin College.

“I look forward to being a resource to faculty members,” she said, noting that faculty seeking new initiatives or funding for projects need good data to demonstrate need or interest or to verify results.

Recognition of the value of this new administrative position at Austin College originated with an Institutional Effectiveness Committee that has been active for several years, charged with ensuring the College makes very deliberate, informed decisions as to curricular change, program additions, appointments, etc. Research data and assessment tools were vital in supporting those decisions, Nelson said. Too, the beginning of a new college strategic planning phase (through 2010) and preparation for Austin College’s reaffirmation of accreditation through the Southern Association of Colleges simply involves more than can be handled with the previous Institutional Research staffing.

Nelson’s position also will require her to be aware of national changes and trends in higher education and gather appropriate data about those changes. That won’t be a new area for her as recent work in chapter review for the Phi Beta Kappa Committee on Qualifications has caused her to become aware of the national arena. She said she also became quite excited after attending a conference on civic engagement and discussed the range of campus activities that promote civic engagement, and ways to measure and assess those activities.

Little about the area of research and assessment will be new for Nelson. A Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Clark University, she completed master’s and doctoral studies at Harvard University in psychology and human development. She has long been involved with research within the field of psychology, including several projects within the local community. She also has been involved with previous SAC accreditation reaffirmations and a variety of programmatic research and assessment endeavors in her 30 years at Austin College.

Measuring and assessing take lots of time, time that Nelson will not be in the classroom. She will continue to teach “History and Schools of Psychology” and that will allow her some time with students. “The hardest thing to deal with in taking this position was not to be in the classroom,” Nelson said. During 1995 through 1999, she served as assistant dean and had reduced teaching responsibilities. Now, she has even less classroom time. She will, however, be working on research and assessment projects with many campus individuals and likens that to consulting work she has done in the past. “I have always seen that as a form of instruction,” she said. 

With the research and measurement tasks already on her schedule — and the surety of many more to come, opportunities for such teaching should abound. 

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Austin College Faces SACS Review

A quest for academic excellence is at the heart of the Austin College mission and that quest continues with the College’s scheduled 2009 reaffirmation of accreditation as an institution of higher education by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS). The process includes preparation of extensive documentation by College personnel, followed by examination of that material by peer review committees selected by SACS. Reaffirmation of accreditation is required every 10 years.

One important part of the process is the development of a “Quality Enhancement Plan” (QEP), which, according to SACS literature, should be an initiative that has broad support of the College constituencies and has the potential to have a lasting, substantive, and positive effect on student learning.

Austin College is in the initial stages of the development of its QEP, which must be submitted early in 2009. In spring 2007, Mike Imhoff, vice president for Academic Affairs, appointed Steve Goldsmith, professor of biology, to chair the QEP committee. The faculty then elected a QEP committee of six: David Baker (physics), Bart Dredge (sociology), Patrick Duffey (Spanish); Karánn Durland (philosophy), Greg Kinzer (English), and Julia Shahid (education). The committee is responsible for facilitating the selection of the QEP topic, which will be completed by a vote of the faculty.

The selection process began this fall with proposals for the QEP topic submitted to the committee by faculty and staff, and will be complete by December. Once the topic is selected, the committee will solicit additional input into the specific initiatives from faculty, staff, administrators, students, and trustees of the College. With this base of input, the committee will develop a QEP that addresses the various stipulations of SACS.

The QEP must focus on student learning or the environment that supports student learning. The college must demonstrate that it can achieve the initiatives of the QEP with available resources, and must have plans to do so within a five-year time frame. The effects of the QEP on student learning must be assessed so that the success of the QEP can be demonstrated.

Another SACS criterion is that the process, the initiative, and its implementation be effectively communicated to various constituencies of the College. This and future articles in Austin College Magazine will allow readers to remain informed on the progress. Other information about SACS requirements for reaffirmation in general, and for the QEP in particular, can be found at the SACS Web site. The Austin College QEP committee will post updates on the College Web site when the process reaches the stage for public comment and input.

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Three Join Board of Trustees

Three individuals joined the Austin College Board of Trustees recently. New to the board are Georgianna Fisher ’69, a community volunteer of Severna Park, Md.; Donald Gibson ’75, cardiovascular surgeon from Houston, Texas; and Luan Beaty Mendel ’75, a community and church volunteer of Palo Verdes, Calif.

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