08.14.2009 | by Cherry Crayton | Filed under Campus News, NC State in the News | Comments: No responses |
From The N&O:
Former N.C. State University Chancellor James Oblinger just got a pay cut.
Oblinger, who resigned in early June amid revelations over his role in the hiring of former First Lady Mary Easley, had until today been earning his full administrative salary - $420,000 annually, or $35,000 a month.
Under an agreement he forged with UNC system President Erskine Bowles when he resigned, he was to receive that full salary for six months before returning to the faculty at a lower wage.
The UNC system’s Board of Governors voted Friday to scale his pay back immediately. He will now earn $173,000 annually, a salary commensurate with other members of the NCSU faculty. He will teach food science.
“This is absolutely an appropriate salary, and after such a careful process I am completely comfortable with it,” said James Woodward, NCSU’s interim chancellor.
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07.01.2009 | by Chris Richter | Filed under Campus News, Red & White for Life blog, Seven Questions | Comments: One response |
Thanks to everyone who submitted questions for Chancellor Woodward. We spoke with him Monday about everything from tenure to athletics to transparency to e-mail. An edited transcript follows. We hope to announce our next “Seven Questions” subject soon.
1) You talk a lot about transparency. Can you explain what that means to you, why you think it’s important and what you plan to do to spread that mindset throughout the university?
It really goes in two directions. Let me talk internally, because that’s a lot easier to speak to. The campus community needs to understand [and] needs to have reasonably full information on how major decisions are made and, where appropriate, an opportunity to participate in those decisions. To some degree, I’m talking about faculty, but there are other organized groups on campus—students and staff—as well. Internally, transparency [means] that key decisions will result after there is appropriate consultation. Once decisions are made, they will be carefully explained. That’s not to say that you make, say, budget decisions based on a democracy. That’s not it. This is a hierarchy. But the faculty, staff and students need to understand, for example, how the budget decisions we’re now confronting are made and why and, when appropriate, have a say so in [them]. (more…)
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06.10.2009 | by Chris Richter | Filed under Campus News | Comments: 3 responses |
Chancellor Jim Woodward spoke with us earlier today about alumni, NC State’s image and the work that’s ahead.
What’s your message to alumni? [T]he NC State that our alums came to love is the same NC State. And it is because the university is principally defined by its faculty and staff—those who do the work of the university. That faculty and staff today is still the outstanding faculty and staff it was a week ago. So, alums, know that this is still the institution that you love and that you have been and should be proud of.
No matter what one thinks of how this situation came about, it’s obvious that NC State’s image has taken a hit. How can it be repaired? The image of a university is developed over a long period of time and is based principally on the good work it does. There is no question that the image has taken a hit as a result of these events over the last several months. That can be dealt with. That will dissipate if we keep our eye on why we exist as a university and do good work. Having said that, it’s important that I, as the new interim chancellor, reinforce to all of our constituencies that we do good work and that, furthermore, we are a well-administered university that understands it is owned by the people of North Carolina, and we must be transparent to those who represent the people. That includes the political leadership, certainly, but it also includes the media.
With the budget crisis and other issues, your job is going to be different from that of a “typical” interim chancellor. How are you going to approach those challenges? I guess this is a unique appointment in that I had nearly a day and a half notice before I showed up on campus. (more…)
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06.09.2009 | by Chris Richter | Filed under Campus News, Faculty News | Comments: One response |
Yesterday at the press conference in the Park Center, UNC System President Erskine Bowles made a point to describe Jim Woodward, right, as “chancellor in the interim” rather than interim chancellor. Chancellor Woodward will be leading NC State through a challenging period in which it will be rebuilding its leadership team and dealing with difficult budget-related decisions.
Woodward, who was chancellor of UNC-Charlotte from 1989 to 2005, already has some experience at NC State. During the 1968-69 school year, he was an assistant professor of engineering mechanics. From Raleigh, he moved to the University of Alabama-Birmingham (UAB), where he worked his way up to senior vice president. He has bachelor’s, master’s and a doctoral degree from Georgia Tech and an MBA from UAB.
Woodward helped to lead a transformation of UNC-Charlotte. As Business North Carolina wrote in 2004:
Appearances weren’t UNCC’s only problem. Though academically solid, it was a second-tier school, the first choice of few top students and a commuter campus for back-to-school housewives and community-college transfers. “One point Jim made to me repeatedly,” [Molly] Broad says, “was that Charlotte was the biggest and most important city without a major research university in the country. He was absolutely right.”
And he had set about changing that before Broad became UNC president in 1997. He persuaded the university system’s Board of Governors in 1993 to allow UNCC to offer two doctoral programs in engineering and one in math. “We’ve just got permission to plan our 13th doctoral program,” he says now. “That’s the single most important thing during my years here. If that hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t be sitting here, because we couldn’t have built a major university.”
The Charlotte Observer wrote about him today, as did Technician. We’ve already posted an article from the Georgia Tech Alumni Association. In 1999, Woodward talked at length with the UNC-TV program Black Issues Forum. And after the jump you can see a picture of Woodward Hall, a science and technology building on the UNC-Charlotte campus that’s named for Chancellor Woodward and his wife, Martha. (more…)
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