Provost Patrick Farrell addressed a lunch-hour forum on challenges facing UW-Madison, a major topic for a first-year provost to tackle amidst rising tuition costs and the university finding itself increasingly at odds with the state Legislature.
The Brown Bag Forum was sponsored by the Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education.
Farrell presented five areas in which he said UW-Madison found itself challenged, including faculty, staff and student retention, relations with the state of Wisconsin, educational excellence, research, and difficulties in coping with budget cuts.
Farrell spoke most highly of the university's research efforts, but said the university needed to strive to take the advances to the next level.
""We've been leaders in this field so long, it would be kind of a fun experiment to say, ‘what's next,'"" Farrell said.
He also emphasized his desire for the university and state Legislature to mend an increasingly chilly relationship.
""There are times when I think we think the state doesn't understand us, and quite honestly, I think there are times when we don't understand the state,"" Farrell said.
UW System Board of Regents member Charles Pruitt corroborated Farrell's sentiments.
""So much of our resources depend on the state government,"" Pruitt said. ""We're working hard to build individual relationships with individual legislatures. ... We're committed to doing whatever we can.""
Finally, Farrell frankly addressed the university's dwindling resources. The provost said he would prefer to characterize the issue in terms of choosing carefully, as opposed to the conundrum of how to do more with less. He added the university needed to ""lose the acrimony"" over the situation.
""We're going to have to choose not to do things that are really good ideas,"" Farrell said. ""That's really hard to do, but we have to get good at it.""
