(06-04-2016 02:53 PM)JMUETC Wrote: (06-04-2016 02:25 PM)HotHamandCheese84 Wrote: [b]To be fair, there are a number of accomplishments during the last 4 years under President Alger. I know I will leave some out, but the highlights are the hiring of Withers for Football and paying for 2/3 of the locker room refurbishment (the rest was paid by a private group), the hiring of Houston for football, the Honors College approval, the rebuilding of the relationship with the faculty, and leading the largest comprehensive fund raising campaign. [\b]Longhorn can provide more positives as part of the Alger admin.
There are questions we need to ask:
1. What is the execution plan on the strategic plan?
2. What is the succession plan for a number of the people on the senior leadership team?
3. Is JMU better now than it was 4 years ago?
I'm really not trying to be critical, I am honestly trying to understand.
My understanding is that Withers was brought to us by Carr or an influential Alumni. So maybe the accomplishment is listening to the paid consultant (hard to give too much credit for that). Paying for the locker room is facilities so although important, I consider this easy. Especially why people stake you for 1/3 of it. (If JMU history is any indication). Hiring of a coach who hasn't coached a game is considered an accomplishment? If so, is it Algers or Human Resources accomplishment?
Approving the Honors College. This one I'm very interested in and would love to know more. From some of your past posts, I know you and others have been working on this for a long time. I will give Alger credit, but again, this is an approval. If smart guys like you are planning it, he'd be crazy not to approve. Of course, there could be a lot more to it than that.
Approving the faculty relationship is very important. I'm interested in knowing more about this as well. How specifically did he do this? What have been the measurable results, for example.
Leading the largest fundraising campaign is an incomplete. What have the results been as a result of his leadership?
I am really genually interested in some of these accomplishments so that I can pass them along to people that ask me about JMU (and sometimes Alger).
The President has the final say in who gets hired as a Coach. Alger approved the Mickey's termination of employment and the hiring of Withers. Yes, we had a search firm for Withers but the call was Alger's. He took a risk on Withers and it paid off.
Spending $200,000 on a locker room is not chump change and it is Alger's call. If he didn't approve of it, it would have had to been funded by private dollars only. Withers wanted it and Alger approved the funding. Is it the largest expenditure? No. Did it show dedication to what a new Coach wanted for the program? Yes.
As for the Honors College, Alger did not have to fast track it with the BOV but he did so as part of the strategic plan. He could have easily waited to see how the fund raising was going before pushing the Honors College, but the first class will be in 2017. Alger realizes that we need the Honors College to compete with other schools in Virginia and in the South. Now, VA Tech wants their Honors Program to be an Honors College because we have moved into the Honors College space ahead of them and we are recruiting top students away from Tech with the move to the Honors College. VA Tech is the institution we compete with more than any other college or university in Virginia for top students. If a student gets into UVA and JMU, we have a 25% shot at getting that student if we offer some scholarship money. If a student gets into VA Tech and JMU, we have a 50-50 shot. Tech is now offering more scholarship money than JMU is for the top students and they have been successful over the years in getting a number of kids to head to Blacksburg because they told students that both JMU and Tech were Honors Programs so the difference was the money. Now, JMU is telling these top students that we will be an Honors College and Tech is behind on this front. Alger and his team are doing the heavy lifting along with the Honors Program Director who will be the new Dean. The Honors College would not have happened on the fast track without the relationships Alger built with the faculty.
As for the faculty relationship, he got them a raise and he's more inclusive of faculty opinions and ideas. He also utilizes the faculty in a number of committees and he listens to their issues and acts on many of them. I have talked to some professors and some Deans and they are happier about the communication and the inclusiveness by Alger. This has helped in retention of key faculty and in recruiting new faculty. Does a ton more need to happen for the faculty, like more endowments and chairs, sure. Alger has been pushing for these as part of the campaign.
As for the campaign, Alger easily could have done something like we did during our first campaign. He could have made the goal really low, like $70,000,000, so it could be eclipsed before it really was made public. He did not do that. The number is much higher than $70,000,000. I am not sure that the actual number has been made public and I don't want to provide non-public information. If it has been made public, someone please correct me and put the number out there. In my opinion, I think the campaign number should have been bigger but I also know that once this current campaign ends, there will be another one coming down the road that will have a higher number. Alger has also landed some multi-million dollar gifts to the university during his 4 years and those are already public. I admit that the proof will be in the actual dollars raised as to whether the campaign is ultimately successful but he's out there pushing a large number.
Has he done everything right or quick enough for everyone on the Boards? No. Have there been some missteps? Sure. Are there some things I would do differently if I were in his chair? Yes. Does he deserve some of the criticism he gets on the Boards? Yes. Does he deserve all of it? No.
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O/T BOV meeting today in Festival Boardroom
