A call to action from Gov. Phil Bredesen has led to a university-wide goal: to become a top 25 public university in the nation.
Chancellor Jimmy Cheek said in a report at the UT Board of Trustees meeting on Thursday afternoon that Bredesen challenged UT to become a top 25 university back in January. Immediately after that, a task force was put together, set out to accomplish this.
It’s a goal that is not just for the notoriety, Cheek said.
“It’s not just to have the designation of being a top 25 university but to have that designation because we’re doing a better job,” Cheek said.
He said it would make UT a better institution for students and for the people of the state. In addition, the higher UT made it up the ranks, the more its graduation rate and freshmen retention would improve.
In terms of graduation rate and rankings, Cheek said the university needs to get better faster than its current rate.
“We need to improve more like Minnesota and less like the University of Tennessee at Knoxville,” he said.
The broad-based task force, chaired by Bruce Bursten of the College of Arts and Sciences, included faculty, staff and students. The task force put together a plan between January and June for what to target in attempting to become top 25. Cheek said the “how” would come at a future meeting.
The task force looked at a “target group,” made up of the universities ranked No. 21 through No. 29 and compared data between UT, currently ranked No. 52 out of the 600 total public institutions in the country, with those schools.
The data comparison showed that while UT is on par with target group schools in ACT scores, the university is behind in other areas.
Freshmen retention rate is 84 percent to the target group’s 90 percent. With six-year graduation rate, UT is at 60 percent, while the top 25 target group’s schools are at 75 percent. In other areas, like Ph.D production, UT needs a greater leap — an 80-percent increase — in order to catch up to the target group.
“Those gaps must be closed over time if we are to become a top 25 university,” Cheek said.
Other places where UT lags behind include average tenure-line faculty salary range and faculty awards.
Cheek said it would be difficult. The only school that has moved up 18 spots is the University of Pittsburgh, which took the school a decade to accomplish. No one has moved up 27 spots like UT must to become top 25, he said.
“But I think we’re up to the challenge,” Cheek said. “It’s an ambitious goal. It’s one that we want to achieve and one that we’re committed to achieve.”

Planning eases pains of budget crunch

UT Interim President Jan Simek said in his annual president's report at the UT Board of Trustees meeting on Thursday afternoon that despite the current budget crisis, planning has put the university in a better position.
"We will not be the same institution in 2012 that we were in 2008, but we have planned for this and we have positioned ourselves very well," Simek said.
He said UT is not among the high-cost educations in the nation, and the school can work toward minimizing the impact of budget shortfalls.
Simek aimed for "a gentle landing -- to be mindful of the people who work for us, to be thoughtful of the individuals who compose our families, to work hard to have as little impact, though we all recognize that impact is necessary, on people as much as we could."
He said 600 positions in the UT system will be cut by the time the stimulus money runs out. In that, only 50 to 60 actual people lose their jobs, with the rest being empty positions.
He said the university has streamlined system administration, with fewer vice presidents, fewer system overhead. As a result, the system has been reduced by millions, and its role is better defined.
Simek agreed with Bredesen and Cheek about pursuing the quest to become a top 25 university.
"I continue to believe that the University of Tennessee is the best that it's ever been in its history," he said.