Liberal EducationVOL. 93, NO. 3 SUMMER 2007 A SSOCIATION OF A MERICAN C OLLEGES AND U NIVERSITIES

2007 ANNUAL MEETING

From Recovery to Renewal at page 6 Saving Higher Education in the Age of Money page 14 Democracy, Diversity, and Presidential Leadership page 22

ALSO INSIDE: On the Practicality of a Liberal Education page 28 Faculty Accountability and Cultural Inclusiveness page 32 A Campus, Not a Sanctuary page 46 SCOTT COWEN Tulane University:

HURRICANE KATRINA took more than 1,500 lives. Most of those people died in their homes because they could not escape, or they died trying to escape the flood waters. The hurricane submerged 80 percent of the parish, a land mass seven times the size of Manhattan. The flood lasted for fifty-seven days and destroyed over 160,000 homes and apartments. Kat- rina caused the largest metropolitan diaspora in the history of the , displacing more than 80 percent of the population. Prior to the storm, the population of was 465,000; within two weeks of the storm, it was 10,000; today, it is about 225,000. Katrina led to 22 mil- lion tons of debris—more than enough to fill the Superdome thirteen times, or quadruple the amount of debris that resulted from the tragedy at the World Trade Center on 9/11. FEATURED TOPIC I was on campus on August 29, 2005. Tulane University’s hurricane pre- paredness plan calls for the president of the uni- versity, along with four or five other senior people, to remain on the campus in the event of a category four or five There is no doubt hurricane. I went to the designated place on campus thinking it would be in my mind that, just another storm and that we would be back in business again in a cou- ple of days. When I heard on the news that the levees had been breached, three to five years I said to the five people with me that we probably ought to spend the night from now, Tulane on campus and see what impact, if any, the breach of the levees would will be a stronger have. Within forty-eight hours, two-thirds of our uptown campus, which and better institu- covers about 120 acres, was under water. We lost all communications— telephones, satellite phones, cell phones, computers—and there was no tion than it was sewage system, no water, and no power. By the time we finally evacuated before the storm to Houston, Texas, on the Friday after the storm, Tulane University no longer existed.

Recovery The three most important decisions affecting the recovery of the institu- tion were made within twenty-four hours of our evacuation to Houston. The first of these was the decision to reopen the university, as previously scheduled, on January 17, 2006. That was a hubristic decision; at the time, we had no idea how we would do it, how much it would cost, who would do it, or how we would pay for it. But none of that mattered be- cause we knew that if Tulane didn’t open in January 2006, it would proba- bly never open again. We had to announce the decision right away to give people confidence.

SCOTT COWEN is president of Tulane University. This article is adapted from the keynote address to the American Conference of Academic Deans luncheon, held in conjunction with the AAC&U annual meeting.

6LIBERAL E DUCATION S UMMER 2007 From Recovery to Renewal

Tulane University FEATURED TOPIC Tulane University dren toattend.We realizedthatoneofthe return iftherewerenoschoolsfortheirchil- over theworld,wereaskinghowtheycould and ouremployees,nowscatteredincitiesall when thepublicschoolsystemwouldreopen, someplace towhichtheycouldreturn. order toreassurepeoplethattherewouldbe ing. We hadtobuildaself-containedvillagein that therestofNewOrleanswasnotfunction- task. Whatwedidnotimmediatelyrealizewas our campuswasthesimplestpartofentire out, however, thatthephysicalrestorationof all thebuildingsandcampusitself.Itturned We thoughtthatallwehadtodowasrestore we startedtofocusontheJanuaryreopening. ask forhelpwithourstudents. out tothehighereducationcommunityand Finally, thethirddecisionwemadewastoreach and withoutthosepeopleyouhavenothing. it isthepeoplewhomakeforgreatuniversities, to getpaychecks.Moreover, werecognizedthat was tobeunsureaboutwhethertheyweregoing tragedies andthatthelastthingtheyneeded and staffweregoingthroughtheirownpersonal was comingin.Butweknewthatourfaculty million permonth,atatimewhennomoney possible. Thatdecisioncosttheinstitution$35 tinue topayallfacultyandstaffforaslong 8L By lateSeptemberwestilldidnotknow After makingthosethreecrucialdecisions, The seconddecisionwemadewastocon- IBERAL E DUCATION S UMMER 2007 staff, andtheir families.Andmanybusinesses, had broughtback thestudents,faculty, the the parishhadincreasedby 20 percent.We 2006. Within threedays,thepopulation of the recoveryofNewOrleans. volved Tulane students,faculty, andstaffin also startedapublicserviceinitiativethatin- initiatives asIspentonuniversityissues.We city, Ispentasmuchtimeonpublic education with anewplanforpubliceducationinthe chair thecommunity-wideefforttocomeup on majorrolesinthecityitself.Askedto ployer inthecity, somanyofusbegan totake time. Tulane Universityisthelargestem- New Orleanswasgoingthroughaterrible November, andDecember2005—thecityof and residents,continuetooperatetoday. Those freeclinics,staffedbyTulane doctors whoneededit. city toprovidecareanybody Salvo, offeredtosetupthreeclinicsacrossthe health sciencecenter, oneofwhom,KarenDe- we haveamarveloussetofphysiciansinour Orleans; allofthehospitalswereclosed.But to live. River. Everyonewhocamebackhadaplace from IsraelandparkingitontheMississippi berths fortwothousandpeople,bringingit not enough.Soweleasedacruiseshipwith bought anapartmentbuilding,butstillitwas We housingoncampusand builtmodular to, wedecidedtogointothehousingmarket. not knowwhethertheyhadhousingtoreturn thousand ofourfaculty, staff,andstudentsdid and healthcare.Whenwelearnedthatthree lane, Dillard,Xavier, andLoyolauniversities. daughters offacultyandstaffmembersatTu- hundred ofthosestudentswerethesonsand thousand studentsinattendance.Aboutfour January 17,2006,withapproximatelyone to chartertheschool.Theschoolopenedon million, andweconvincedtheschoolboard that shewouldneedmoney. We provided$1.5 the schoolwouldhavetobechartered;and several teacherstoplanthecurriculum;that make thatpossible,shetolduswouldneed to reopentheschoolbyJanuary17,2006.To to Houston,andtoldherthatweneeded Sowe foundtheprincipal,broughther hood. Lusher School,wasrightinourneighbor- finest elementaryschoolsinNewOrleans, Tulane UniversityreopenedonJanuary17, During thisperiod—September, October, There wasnohealthcareavailableinNew The nextchallengeswefacedwerehousing By the time especially the bars and restau- we finally evacuated to make bold decisions quickly. rants, had timed their reopen- to Houston, Texas, This is a lesson to be learned ings to coincide with ours. We on the Friday by all of us. At what pace do built the village, and it turned you make decisions? In a cata- out to be a pretty good village. after the storm, strophe, the longer you wait, The Tulane University Tulane University the more you put your institu- campus is completely free of no longer existed tion in jeopardy. Of course, water now, and every single the faster you make decisions, building is up and running. In the more you open yourself up fact, since we wound up having to do about a to criticism from those who did not partici- quarter of a million dollars worth of construc- pate in the decision making. But with the FEATURED TOPIC tion and repairs, the campus looks better than benefit of hindsight, we are grateful we did it did before the storm. But the story goes be- what we did as quickly as we did it. yond that. First of all, we survived Hurricane A second lesson learned concerns the im- Katrina. At 80 percent of the pre-Katrina portance of self-reliance. When we were in level, our current enrollment has exceeded Houston, we determined quickly that we expectations. Moreover, despite the fact that could not rely on the Federal Emergency we were closed for half of it, last year was an Management Agency, the insurance compa- extraordinarily strong research year. Although nies, or the White House. We knew that we our faculty members were scattered across the had to control our own destiny. We also real- country, they were still writing research ized that we had to change the way we viewed grants. We also had a very strong fundraising the role of our institution in community en- year, despite the fact that we did not raise any gagement, both locally and nationally. money for the five months we were in the trenches building our village. And our endow- Renewal ment grew significantly. Finally, we formed In December 2005, we undertook the largest lasting partnerships with the other local uni- restructuring of an American university in versities, and Tulane will continue to play a over one hundred years. The objectives were new and active role in New Orleans. to save the institution financially and to bet- One of the reasons Tulane University sur- ter position it for an academic recovery in the vived is that we were willing future. Both objectives had to be met, but the

Tulane University

S UMMER 2007 LIBERAL E DUCATION 9 FEATURED TOPIC Annual Meeting 0L 10 children toTulane. Buttheotherreasonwas the endparentswerehesitanttosendtheir though wereceivedalotofapplications,in 962. Onereasonforthedeclinewasthat,al- than usual:rather1,400students,wehad cult decisions. as muchtheyhave.Onemustmakediffi- more, andotherunitsprobablydonotdeserve recognize thefactthatsomeunitsdeserve stitution; across-the-boardcutsdonot lieve, istheworstthingyoucandoforanin- to makecutsacrosstheboard.Butthat,Ibe- we didandhowit.Thealternativewas that wehadtobeveryselectiveaboutwhat increased qualityinthefuture,whichmeant the universityforanenhancedreputationand the costs. The onlyoptionwastoreduce was nowaytoclosethegap. base wentdown,andthere lion peryear. Therevenue on anongoingbasis,$75mil- versity wasprojectedtolose, our projectedlosses.Theuni- solutely essentialbecauseof financial restructuringwasab- The 2006enteringclasswasmuchsmaller We also knewthatweneededtoposition IBERAL E DUCATION S UMMER 2007 role ofourinstitution role both locallyand change theway we viewedthe in community engagement, We hadto nationally they haveacommonfirst-yearexperience. longer thantheydidpriortothestorm,and example. Studentshavetoliveoncampus graduation requirementforallstudents, student-centered. Publicserviceisnowa make theentireexperiencemorecampus-and undergraduate collegeforallstudents,andto of experience.Sowedecidedtocreateasingle led toduplicationofeffortandinconsistency ing ontheirinterests.That,wediscovered, through oneofsevendifferentdoors,depend- gram, butitwasfragmented.Studentsentered undergraduatepro- already hadaverygood The firstwastheundergraduatefocus.Tulane and graduateprograms. with aselectgroupofhigh-qualityresearch rience asstellarpossible,andsurroundit The renewalplanhadfourcornerstones. make theundergraduateexpe- Our strategywasfairlysimple: focused onincreasingquality. of theinstitution.Instead,we to giveupthe172-yearlegacy have donesowouldbeen students. We believedthatto credentials oftheincoming compromise ontheacademic that wedidnotsignificantly These features of the new program are not and, by reinvesting the money saved, to revolutionary, but they are very important. strengthen the remaining programs. The deci- The second cornerstone was academic re- sions involved in implementing our renewal alignment. We had to make some very tough plan were very difficult but, in the end, the decisions about a few of our schools, including results are not only saving our institution but the schools of engineering and medicine. also, more importantly, giving reasons for Those decisions led to the consolidation of optimism about our future. units and to an overall decrease in the size of the faculty. They were, by far, the most Challenges going forward painful decisions we had to make, but they Tulane University now faces four major chal- were necessary in order to maintain financial lenges. The first concerns the image of the FEATURED TOPIC viability and quality. university, which is largely formed by what is The third cornerstone of our renewal plan said about New Orleans in the newspapers was new partnerships. We are now doing and on the television and the radio around things at the university that we never did be- the country. Recently, for example, there was fore. We now have an institute for public edu- a series of articles in the New York Times cation initiatives that reports directly to the about the increase in crime in New Orleans. president and focuses exclusively on the ad- There was indeed an increase; it is serious, vancement of public school success. We now and we are dealing with it. The same thing also have an institute focused on issues of race happens in every other city, of course, but it is and poverty in our community, and we have a not written about in the same way. Similarly, center for pubic service that organizes all of USA Today has reported about the mental our civic engagement activities. So we created health issues faced by our population; and, a number of new units both to advance our yes, there are pressing mental health issues. mission locally and, hopefully, to establish a But there are also many positive things going national model. on in New Orleans. Finally, the fourth cornerstone was to re- The only way we can get people to change duce by one-third the number of PhD programs their image of New Orleans is to encourage

Scott Cowen, Annual Meeting

S UMMER 2007 LIBERAL E DUCATION 11 FEATURED TOPIC Annual Meeting 2L 12 real sourceofoptimism. embracing thechallenge,andthathasbeena running awayfromthechallenge;theyare what wehavebeenthrough.Theyarenot ulty whocometoNewOrleansbecauseof hiring adifferentkindoffacultymember, fac- able tohirenewfaculty. Butinfact,weare tions, andweworriedthatwouldbeun- of bothvoluntaryandinvoluntarysepara- We lostanumberoffacultymembers,because going muchbetterthanwehadanticipated. to retainandrecruitfaculty. Thatisactually that, andwearehavingalotofsuccess. ents say, “no.”We areworkingtoovercome students wanttocome,butintheendpar- get lotsofapplications,the come the“parentfactor”;we students. We neededtoover- on theparentsthan year’s class,wefocusedmore messaging.” Inrecruitinglast university, wedo“counter- home andtalkaboutit.Atthe themselves, andthengoback them tovisitthecity, seeitfor The secondmajorchallengeistocontinue IBERAL E DUCATION S UMMER 2007 One ofthereasons Hurricane Katrina Hurricane Tulane University Tulane is that we were is thatwewere willing tomake bold decisions survived survived quickly bounded beautifully. there. Theyhaveturnedthecornerandre- cine, thefaculty, thestaff,andstudents am incrediblyproudoftheschoolmedi- separate challengesfortheinstitution.ButI schools inthecountry, anditposesitsown medical school.Itisoneofthefinest Conclusion we havedone,knowswhatitisliketo have beenthrough,andwhohasdonewhat whohasbeenthroughwhatwe Anybody my life,andclearlyIamnotPollyannish. been throughanunusualeighteenmonthsin Tulane andoneaboutNewOrleans.Ihave I concludewithtwostatements,oneabout University facesconcernsthe fourth majorchallengeTulane the remainder. Finally, the that, intime,wewillrecover lane lost;butwearehopeful more than$500millionTu- ered justafractionofthe jor challenge.We haverecov- institution posesthethirdma- The financialhealthofthe survive. There is no doubt in my mind that, three to five years from now, Tulane will be a PODCASTS stronger and better institution than it was be- fore the storm. I never would have wished this catastrophe on our institution, but I think our AAC&U ANNUAL MEETING PODCASTS recovery is going to take a pace and have a The annual meeting of the Association of American Colleges and substance to it that will make us better and Universities was held in New Orleans, , from January 17 stronger. And nothing I have seen in the last to 20, 2007. The following presentations were recorded and are eighteen months changes my view of that. now available as podcasts from the AAC&U Web site. I also can guarantee that, three to five years Through the Prism of Katrina: Engaging Students in the World FEATURED TOPIC from now, New Orleans will be a better city By Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness than it was before the storm. How can I be so Account of the Death Penalty in the United States and The Death of optimistic? Think about what makes New Or- Innocents: An Eyewitness Account of Wrongful Executions leans special. It is the only city in America that can lay claim to its own language, its own And Justice for All: Using the Power of Education food, its own architecture, and its own music. to Transform Our World It has a bizarre heritage and culture, but that By Paula Rothenberg, former director of the New Jersey Project on is why people come to New Orleans. That is Inclusive Scholarship, Curriculum, and Teaching why tourists come. That is why those of us who are here, stay here: it is fun to be in this Fulfilling the Promise of a Just Democracy: New Orleans After Katrina quirky city. New Orleans does something for By Marvalene Hughes, president of you that no other city in America does. And all of those attributes remain today, and they Saving Higher Education in the Age of Money will remain in three and five years’ time. By James Engell and Anthony Dangerfield, winners of the 2007 Before the storm, we had a lot of problems Frederic W. Ness Book Award in this city that we did not talk about. We did not talk about public education or racial issues Taking the Lead on What Matters in College: or the blighted neighborhoods the way we Principles of Excellence for the New Global Century should have. We knew the levees were not By Carol Geary Schneider, president of AAC&U, Deborah Traskell, safe, but we did not talk about it. But we are senior vice president of the State Farm Mutual Automobile Insur- talking about all of those issues now. So I have ance Company, and Blenda Wilson, president of the Nellie Mae Education Foundation no doubt that New Orleans will be a better city in three to five years. Reforming Higher Education’s Hollow Core The only question I have about New Or- By Anne D. Neal, president of the American Council of Trustees leans is whether it will be as good a city as it and Alumni, Erin K. O’Connor, professor of English at the University could be if its political leadership had the of Pennsylvania, and Candace DeRussy, trustee of the State Uni- courage, the vision, and a plan to make it so. versity of New York We all wish that our political leaders at all levels of government had made bolder and Tulane University: From Recovery to Renewal quicker decisions about a lot of things. And I By Scott S. Cowen, president of Tulane University am very sympathetic because I understand the complexity of the issues this city faces. We Using Evidence to Document Liberal Education Outcomes and Promote Institutional Change have lost some time, but we will make it up By George Kuh and Robert Gonyea of Indiana University Blooming- and eventually see the fruits of our labor in ton, Linda Calendrillo of Valdosta State University, David Eubanks our great city. ■ of Coker College, and Judy Ouimet of University of Nevada–Reno

To respond to this article, e-mail [email protected], How Benjamin Franklin Learned about Democracy’s Values with the author’s name on the subject line. By Walter Isaacson, president and chief executive officer of the Aspen Institute

www.aacu.org/podcast

S UMMER 2007 LIBERAL E DUCATION 13