03/04/2002

OK - just who is the fire consultant? - We completed the last in a series of three Elected Officials Academies at 3:15 PM Saturday afternoon in Knoxville. We had about 15 city officials from several cities including four councilmembers from Chattanooga and three from Knoxville. If you had peeked through the door at 7:00 PM Friday night, you would have seen Rex Barton explaining the complexities of the ISO rating system for fire departments! Ray Crouch was making a speed run from Paris Landing to Knoxville and had hit more traffic than he expected going through Nashville. As a result, Rex stepped in to give Ray's presentation. Ray arrived at about 7:45 PM in time to complete the presentation and to answer questions. It was a high degree of police and fire cooperation. Thanks to Rex and Ray.

Dr. John Shumaker - The Knoxville News Sentinel says that Dr. John Shumaker will be confirmed as the next President of UT by the Board of Trustees at its meeting in Nashville on Tuesday, March 5. Dr. Shumaker came to the Knoxville campus Friday (March 1) and met with faculty, staff, and students for about two hours. I attended and was very impressed. I've seen Mayors and City Managers handle tough questions during public meetings. University presidents have public meetings that are, if anything, even more difficult. Dr. Shumaker handled questions from the serious to the sublime to the ridiculous. The ridiculous included questions about parking and athletics. He answered all the questions with skill and wit. Here's a sampling of some of his more serious comments.

His background includes a PhD. in ancient Greek. He was associate dean of the College of Humanities at Ohio State. He went from there to administrative positions at the State University of New York at Albany. He was then president of the Central Connecticut State University and most recently the University of Louisville.

He still teaches one class but he likes administrative leadership.

The role of a university president (as he paraphrased the Athenian City Oath) is to make the University a better place when you leave it than when you found it. {PS. We've been using the Athenian City Oath at the conclusion of the Elected Officials Academies.

Athenian Oath.doc

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The University exists for its students.

The role of the administration is to create an environment to support the faculty and students.

He believes in shared governance in a University. "I am not a martinet."

Those who are affected by a decision should be involved in that decision. "We are a team in this grand adventure."

At the University of Louisville he has reallocated $21-25 million within the budget. One of the major goals has been to raise faculty and staff salaries. He thinks that staff salaries should be related to the market. {amazing}

A major role for the University is to build the bridge between theory and practice.

He uses email, meetings, and open doors to stay close to the University community. He answers his own email.

He supports affirmative action not because it's the law but because it's right. He set diversity goals for each Dean at Louisville.

He does not micromanage. The University administrators are to manage the farm. His role is to add acreage.

Now for the sublime. In his opening remarks he mentioned that he had been a freshman at the University of Pittsburgh in 1960 - the year that Bill Mazeroski hit the home run that beat the Yankees in the last inning of the World Series. That's something that anyone who lived in Pittsburgh at the time, as I did, cannot forget.
So, I was favorably impressed. I don't know if Dr. Shumaker knows anything about cities or our work with them. We'll worry about that after he's hired.