On March 1, 2006, nine members of the Poly Editorial Board conducted an interview with President Shirley Ann Jackson. The purpose of this interview was to provide Dr. Jackson the chance to respond to questions from the community. Secretary of the Institute Charles Carletta and Vice President for Administration Claude Rounds also attended. The second half of this interview appears here. The first half ran last week, in the April 19 issue of The Polytechnic.

Transcription by Bernadette Colarusso.

Undergraduate Research

Poly: RPI’s undergraduate plan proposes having full participation in its undergraduate research programs. How is RPI going about preparing for changes as far as necessary funding and curriculum changes go?

Jackson: We are in a fund-raising campaign, and we are raising money to support many programs. But, our faculty increase their own research funding—and that creates opportunity for students. It’s kind of a multi-element approach, and I don’t know that the curriculum will get shaken up because there are opportunities in the summer, there are opportunities in terms of senior projects and all of that for students to do research, even during winter break. So, there are many ways that this can be feathered in, and it’s not going to be “one size fits all.” And, it’s going to depend on the school and how different schools define research. About 30 percent of RPI students do research.

Graduate Education

Poly: Are there currently any plans underway to fix the problem RPI seems to be having lately in recruiting graduate students?

Jackson: Actually, our graduate student applications have been going up year after year. In fact, we’re pretty stringent in how we admit grad students these days. We only admit—depending on the program—about 25 or 30 percent of those who do apply. What we’ve done is shifted the relative balance from more of a what used to be primarily a master-level focus to more of a blend of master and doctoral students. The number of Ph.D.f students has gone up year by year, particularly, in the last couple of years. Also, the deans of the schools have been working to develop unique new master-level programs where students can start in the undergrad years and go through kind of an accelerated fashion and end up with both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree, things like that. We are growing the Ph.D. cohort consistently with the growth of our research, and as that grows, the number of doctoral students will grow; but we’ve already seen the shift. A couple of years ago, we had a nominal number of graduate students. It looked like a larger number, but if you looked at the number who were actually full-time, it wasn’t very different than what we have today. We had more bodies around, but we had people who were not full-time, and so we give much more emphasis to having full-time students.

Poly: Can you respond to the criticism that the over-arching policies for graduate tuition and student support are too broad for the many different schools and portfolios here? Do you think we are doing a good job assessing the exceptions caused by this variety?

Jackson: I do. We actually bring in peer review teams of faculty from similar departments or areas at other schools to look at several of our own departments. In some cases, they’ve said that the departments themselves should have more research than they do have. At the same time, in certain areas, such as in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences, we’ve created internally-funded fellowships. For example, we’ve done this for what we call the HASS, the humanities, arts and social sciences, and architecture. We provide a certain number of these, then we challenge people to go out to foundations to try to seek them, then we up the number and so forth. So we already do have more diverse mechanisms than people may realize for handling different cases, but in the case of departments in engineering and science, all the policy is really trying to do is to get us aligned with other departments and other universities. In other universities, there’s a much higher percentage of graduate students who are supported on external research assistantships from faculty members’ contracts than here. We are trying to move into that direction and there’s no graduate program that depends totally on students being on teaching assistants the whole time. And that’s the migration they’re trying to make.

Poly: There have been rumors that certain departments may be forced to cut their graduate students, even those who have started their pursuit of a Ph.D. This type of funding scenario is rather scary; can you respond to the rumors?

Jackson: Well, those things shouldn’t really be said to students because of two things: one, the graduate dean has always worked to ensure that if students lose funding, they remain in good standing so as to not be prohibited from finishing. The second is that departments have a responsibility to admit students in realistic numbers. They shouldn’t admit students that a realistic projection says they can’t support down the line. That’s the kind of alignment that you have to have in order to ensure that you don’t have a lot of those situations. There can always be individual cases where someone’s working with a faculty member who may lose his funding, and that’s when you step in. You try to have kind of a safety net, but it shouldn’t be that 30 more students are admitted than can be supported in a given program.

Carletta: You know, in a funny way it ties back to the whole question—overhead. How you make it all work. (Editor’s note: See Part 1 for discussion of overhead rates and policies.)

FYE

Poly: For a while now, FYE has had a positive impact on our campus, but recently there were some staff cuts and some budget changes that might cause some programs to be eliminated, and—

Jackson: I don’t know about any staff cuts in FYE. So, if you know, you’re telling me news.

Poly: They’re not staff cuts, but—

Jackson: Everybody, we’re working on a more stringent budget, but I don’t think you’re going to see much different in FYE compared to what you’ve seen before. We’re going to go out there, and we’re doing some specific fundraising as well for FYE. But, I know nothing about any staff cuts.

Poly: Do you see a change in how effective FYE is becoming or has become? Do you see anything that will change in that department in the near future?

Jackson: Other than to try and make it more effective? No. When you are growing fast, you do a lot of things. It’s always good to step back and evaluate whether what you are doing works toward the goals you set out to achieve. You change some things, and you eliminate some things; but you add other things or you strengthen other things until…I don’t know a whole lot of detail about what they’re doing, but we’re basically trying to preserve what FYE is. It’s not going away. You have to understand something; like I said, you get on the train where you get on the train. FYE was my baby; I created FYE. I had Eddie re-orient—this sounds redundant—re-orient the orientation, and so there’s no way that FYE is going anywhere while I’m here. I think we all believe that it is very forward-looking, and it’s an important part of the transition of students into Rensselaer. It actually got started before we ever did our first Performance Plan; we created it at the end of that first year at Rensselaer and it’s just been taking off since that.

Undergraduate Education

Poly: What are your opinions regarding the effectiveness of the interactive, studio-based undergraduate curriculum?

Jackson: Well, I think that under the undergraduate plan, [Dean of the Undergraduate School] Prabhat Hajela is going to be leading some discussions and efforts with faculty and other students about the next thing beyond the studio learning as we have it today. But, as for specific things, I can’t tell you. People really are looking at what the next sort of change in pedagogy and teaching should be.

Poly: We’ve talked about the undergraduate plan with regard to research and increasing the student experience. In terms of the actual classes offered, do you feel that the programs and degrees that RPI offers are as in-depth and as intensive as they could or should be?

Jackson: I can’t answer that question for every single course at Rensselaer. I think that’s something that we try to probe through student surveys and so on. And there’s going to be some variability. It’s funny when I think about it. A couple of years ago I was reading The Princeton Review, and there was commentary saying that the courses have been boiled down from being totally ridiculous to nearly impossible. Then, there are those who say, well, we bring in all these professors and then they teach at a level beyond what the students understand; this was in The Princeton Review. So, you are going to hear opinions all over the place but, at the same time, I do know the following in terms of outcomes: one, our students do as well as students from MIT in terms of the jobs they get and what they pay; number two, employers love our students; number three, the students who go to graduate school get into the best graduate programs. Some of them go in and find they’re better than other kids from other places, others go in and find they have to make some adjustments, but they all make the adjustments, and do well. And, so I would say, in general, we offer a great education. Does that mean there isn’t variability? I can’t say, but there probably is always some variability. I think that’s part of why we do surveys with students.

Poly: What are your feelings on the proposed required international experience for students?

Jackson: I think it’s fantastic. You cannot talk about leading in technology and being a global leader if you don’t know anything about the rest of the world. The world is interconnected and it’s becoming more so. Like Tom Freedman says, the world is flat. I think it’s important and you’ll find it’s exciting, and I think it’ll help our students to grow a lot as well as expose them to greater opportunities.

Poly: Do you see a disadvantage to having a required program as opposed to simply having a really strong optional program?

Jackson: When you have a curriculum that’s like ours, you can’t just make it optional. There’s a lot of planning in terms of curriculum, class loading, and scheduling; you cannot make it optional and make it random in that way. So, it’s a big responsibility in terms of how it’s arranged, and where students go and stay, and risk management. So, the answer is no, I think it has to be something that’s part of a structure to approach, and not just getting to go if you want, but not going if you don’t want. If we fundamentally believe it’s an important part of the education, then we really do structure it.

Poly: How would you go implementing a program such as this?

Jackson: Well, I think we’re working through those implementation details because again, it’s going to depend. If you’re in engineering, maybe you might end up going to a village and designing some civil infrastructures somewhere under the guidance of a faculty member or working with some local engineers. Or you could go off and work and do what is effectively a co-op at an international company. It could be one like Motorola that has facilities abroad, or it could be an Indian start-up company. So, there are multiple pathways that are going to have to be worked out. For those in science, you might go work on a research project in a lab somewhere, or maybe in partnership with another university that you go to. So, the deans are beginning to try and think about these things. I think it’s too early to be able to give a lot of details. I think you’ll see it kind of begin to get fleshed out over the course of the next academic year.

Personal Plans

Poly: At this point in your career, do you think that being President of RPI provides the ideal platform for the goals you are trying to accomplish on more of a global scale? You’ve talked extensively about the quiet crisis—

Jackson: Now, what’s the genesis of the question? What’s really underneath the question? Tell me the real question beneath the question.

Poly: In recent past, you’ve been given a number of offers or been recommended for a number of positions that do not necessarily include RPI. We are very grateful that you have expressed an interest in finishing what you have started, but with that said, RPI might not be an ideal platform for long-term—

Jackson: Why not?

Poly: We don’t know, that’s why we’re asking you.

Jackson: I’ve tried to finish what I started, to work at the Plan, and that’s what I’m doing. I’m trying to raise a billion dollars.

Student Life

Poly: Are there any student life issues or concerns that you are planning to address in the near future?

Jackson: I always worry about the safety and health of the students. That can range anywhere from the safety of the campus to suicide prevention to drinking. We worry about all those things; I worry about them all. We are always looking to ensure that we continue this and continue improvement. We’re always looking to do more.

Poly: Are there any new initiatives that are going to be coming out in terms of support systems to make sure students aren’t feeling so much pressure?

Jackson: I think you should talk to [Vice President for Student Life] Eddie Knowles about that. There are some specific things in the Student Life Performance Plan; we’re always looking at that. I think the issue about pressure is one of having people learn how to handle stress, because there will always be stress. Stress does not go away. A little secret to being happy and being professionally successful is learning how to handle stress and making it work to your advantage.

Faculty and Student Senates

Poly: To use some of your own terminology, can you give a report-card for some of the other groups on campus, such as the Student and Faculty Senates? How would you rate them and their priorities? Do you think they are focusing on the right things?

Jackson: I don’t rate organizations. In organizations, people come together; they have issues they struggle with, and sometimes they struggle with other people, but they’re their issues. So, just accept it for what it is.

Poly: Are you happy with the progress that has been made by the Faculty and Student Senates this year in recent past?

Jackson: Again, I think the question is not what my happiness or unhappiness is, it really is “What are we all trying to do for Rensselaer people?” Different people are going at things in different ways, and I think our students and student senators work very hard at what they do, and I’ve been impressed. I think the Faculty Senate and I have had some difficulties, but I don’t have any particular fight with them.