In the wake of unprecedented state disinvestment in the University of Wisconsin System, UW-Madison Chancellor David Ward is calling for a comprehensive reevaluation of business-as-usual on campus. The good news is you can be a part of it.
The Educational Innovation (EI) initiative, proposed by Ward and currently headed by Vice Provosts for Teaching and Learning and Life-long Learning, Aaron Brower and Jeffrey Russell, is the university administration's answer to the question: How can we continue to provide quality education and research in these times of inadequate state support? Seeking to integrate the Wisconsin Idea of serving the public interest with much-needed organizational changes to increase the efficacy of current practices and capacities at the school/college, department, and program level, this initiative truly holds the future of the Wisconsin Experience for students, staff, and faculty in its scope. With state funds constituting little over 15% of the costs to educate UW-Madison's 28,737 undergraduate and 12,074 graduate and professional students, it is clear that now is the time to innovate or dissipate; as a leader among public institutions of higher learning in the world, and as a bastion of democratic and grassroots initiatives to contend with sustained neglect from powerful state interests, now is the time for Madison students to make their voices heard.
The broad range of the topics being discussed at the town-hall style meetings that have taken place over the past few months and which will be continuing throughout the following weeks is indicative of the scope of this massive project. Everything from increasing efficiency of facility-usage, to staggered class-schedules, and even a move to three 15-week semesters a year have been brought to the table. No idea is too broad or too narrow at this stage of the discussion. EI Incubator sessions dealing with specific issues like new revenue, new faculty/assistant professors, and curriculum redesign are scheduled to occur over the next 4 weeks at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery and are open to the public.
Perhaps more importantly for students, the Shared Governance Committee (SGC) of the Associated Students of Madison will be hosting a town-hall meeting on Thursday February 9th from 5:30 - 6:30 p.m. in the 4th Floor Caucus Room of the Student Activities Center at 333 E. Campus Mall. The agenda will consist of a brief overview by students and administrators involved in ground-level discussions of EI and breakout sessions where small groups of students will brainstorm on the following topics:
What do students value most about the educational experience they currently receive at UW-Madison? What would students like to see that is currently not a part of the Wisconsin Experience?
What institutional (or cultural) barriers currently exist that make students' goals for their UW-Madison education difficult or impossible? What resources currently facilitate students' achievement of their educational goals at UW-Madison?
All students on campus are invited to join in the discussion and will get the chance to hear Vice Provost Russell speak more directly about EI and the potential it holds for the future of this campus. SGC hopes that students from all across campus will join the nearly 70 student representatives that regularly sit on the committee to provide the broadest, most inclusive, and strongest student voice possible, in order to take the future of our education into our own hands.
Sundar Sharma is the policy director of the ASM Shared Governance Committee.
