On May 18, the Texas Exes Washington, D.C. Chapter helped spruce up Jefferson Middle School as part of Hands on D.C., a nonprofit that works to improve school conditions. About 10 chapter members and six friends turned out for the day of service, which included cleaning up a gymnasium, painting doors, and hanging basketball nets. The volunteers served a combined 60 hours.

Johann Sung, BS ’04, an at-large board member with the chapter, says he was moved when a student thanked the volunteers for helping his school. “There is no greater reward than to be told by someone that you improved their life,” Sung says.

Photo courtesy Johann Sung.

Correction: An earlier version of this article erroneously said the the version of the bill that now heads to the governor preserved the cap even if the Fisher case is overturned. In fact, that provision was not retained, but a similar provision was included.

Despite a last minute challenge by Sen. Tommy Williams (R-The Woodlands)—who intended to do away with the Top 10 Percent Law altogether—a bill that caps automatic admissions to UT-Austin passed the Texas Senate early Tuesday afternoon. It now heads to Gov. Rick Perry for final approval. The House of Representatives passed the bill earlier this month.

Introduced by House higher education chair Dan Branch (R-Dallas) and sponsored by Senate higher-ed chair Kel Seliger (R-Amarillo), House Bill 1843 extends UT-Austin’s exception to the Top 10 Percent law from the 2015-16 school year, to 2017-18. The exception, or cap, allows the flagship campus to limit the number of students automatically admitted under the Top 10 rule to 75 percent of an incoming freshman class.

Though the cap theoretically gives UT flexibility in admissions, that flexibility could—emphasis on could—be completely done away with in the future if the Supreme Court rules against the University in the Fisher v. University of Texas case. A 2009 measure stated that a court ruling against the use of race in admissions—like UT uses for non-Top 10 students—would nullify the cap. Lawmakers had previously included a provision that would protect the cap against a court decision, but that clause was removed from the final version passed Tuesday. If the Supreme Court rules against the University, the cap will be nullified following the 2017-2018 academic year. The 2018 deadline would allow the next legislature to deal with the fallout from a ruling against UT. The court is expected to announce its decision soon.

UT-Austin president Bill Powers and admissions director Kedra Ishop have endorsed and explained the cap to legislators throughout the session. The bill has also seen support from those who might otherwise oppose a cap, who support the rule’s intent to create diversity.

“For my friend, President Powers, I vote yes,” Sen. Royce West (D-Dallas) said, voting it out of committee and into the full Senate last week.

But the full Senate presented a barrier, at least briefly. Despite support in both chambers, the exemption was almost derailed as it reached its destination. As Seliger brought the bill up for a vote Tuesday afternoon, Williams offered an amendment from the floor—one that would do away with the Top 10 Percent Law entirely. Williams cited a 2005 bill introduced by Seliger that would have done away with the program. Seliger countered that his views on the law had changed since 2005, and that the law had helped to create diversity at public universities.

Rather than subject the amendment to a yes-or-no vote, Seliger voted to table, or set aside, the amendment. The motion to table passed by a close margin, and the bill—without the amendment—passed by a wider one.

A spokesman for Perry said the governor would review the bill in its final form and make a decision whether to sign or veto it.

Editor’s Note: The Texas Exes supports legislation to extend the cap on Top 10. Read more about the Texas Exes legislative priorities here. Photo courtesy Stephanie Sarles via Flickr Creative Commons.

Ray B. Smith, BA ’56, MA ’57, PhD ’67, Life Member, showed his UT pride at a pagoda in Rangoon, Burma, during a Flying Longhorns trip in March. Smith is a retired research scientist.

Crowded classrooms and outdated laboratories may soon be a thing of the past for students at UT’s Cockrell School of Engineering. Working late into the evening Monday, the Texas House of Representatives tentatively approved a bill providing crucial funding for UT’s proposed Engineering Education and Research Center.

Senate Bill 16 (SB 16), authored by Sen. Judith Zaffirini, BS ’67, MA ’70, PhD ’78, Life Member, and carried in the House by Rep. Jim Pitts, Republican from Waxahachie, would fund construction projects at universities across the state. SB 16 was approved by the Senate last month, and now by the House with a $300 million bonus. If approved on third reading in the House, the bill will go back to the Senate to bless before it can be sent to Gov. Rick Perry’s desk.

Bills like SB 16 are traditionally considered every few years in order to keep up with the needs of state universities. Through a mechanism known as tuition revenue bonds—which do not involve tuition or fees—the legislature backs new buildings, labs, and maintenance. But the state has endured a recent drought in construction funding. A tuition revenue bond bill hasn’t passed the legislature since a 2006 special session.

Now the long-anticipated EERC is the closest it has ever been to reality. Support for the omnibus SB 16, which includes all tuition revenue bond projects for universities, has been strong throughout the session. Higher education leaders in the House and Senate, as well as Austin delegation members, have endorsed the bill and the EERC specifically.

Funding for the EERC, if built, will come roughly in thirds from the UT System, private philanthropy, and the money appropriated by SB 16. Cockrell School dean Gregory Fenves has called the EERC UT’s most vital legislative priority aside from base university funding.

Current engineering facilities are severely lacking, with classrooms and labs built for the engineering education of the 1960s. Bringing 430,000 square feet of new multiple-use space, the proposed center would serve as the new home of UT’s largest engineering major, computer and electrical engineering, and serve as a cross-disciplinary home for the Cockrell School.

The House is expected to pass the bill on final reading Tuesday, after which the Senate will consider the House version.

Update: The Senate Nominations Committee unanimously approved all three regent nominees Tuesday. They now go to the full Senate for confirmation.

The chair of the Senate nominations committee had four words for two men hoping to become UT regents and a third who wants to remain one—”move beyond the controversy.”

Sen. Glenn Hegar, a Katy Republican, wrapped up a lengthy and at times pointed hearing that consumed most of the morning and a good part of the afternoon with a clear message for Jeff Hildebrand, Ernest Aliseda, and Paul Foster: Enough is enough. Make it stop. He’s sick of hearing about it.

The “it” is the ongoing tension—it was also called a “situation,” “controversy,” “war,” and “disgraceful mess”—that has pitted the UT System Board of Regents against UT-Austin president Bill Powers and those who support his vision for the campus, including most of the Texas Legislature. Over the course of the 83rd legislative session, that tension rose from bubbling to boiling and is now, with a week to go in the session, perhaps simmering.

It began in February with an emotional show of support for Powers when it was rumored that his job was in jeopardy. Many of the senators who stood up for Powers on the Senate floor were there today in the Betty King room of the Capitol, and some made guest appearances at the hearing even though they aren’t on the nominations committee.

The senators spent most of the hearing asking Regent Foster, who has been on the board for six years already, to answer for a series of events that has irked legislators, from the decision to investigate a now-defunct forgivable loan program to massive and ongoing data requests to what legislators perceive as dilly-dallying with turning over documents they wish to see. Foster, who is considered a swing vote on the board, said he did not condone the actions of some of his colleagues.

If he were to be named the next board chairman, he said, he would work with his regents in a serious effort to significantly reduce not only data requests but the investigative approach taken by some board members. “I don’t think it’s beneficial,” Foster said. “My personal view is that it’s not the right one.”

Hildebrand, a Houston energy executive, said he thought the ongoing tension was “damaging the UT brand,” and that he would do all that he could to keep his (possible) future colleagues focused on setting vision and not micromanaging, a charge the board has faced from legislators. Nor was he coming into the job to do the bidding of his longtime friend Jeff Sandefer, author of the Seven Solutions, or with orders to fire Powers.

“After having spoken with 10 ex-regents,” Hildebrand relayed, “one said ‘Jeff, your job as a regent is to hire great presidents, the chancellor’s job is to fire presidents.’”

Aliseda, a municipal judge from McAllen and U.S. Army Reservist, said he too would defer to the chancellor when it comes to firing a president or not.

“As a member of the military,” Aliseda said. “I’m very cognizant of the chain-of-command.”

Sen. John Whitmire, a Houston Democrat and 40-year veteran of the Legislature, wasn’t convinced. Despite all three men pledging not to remove Powers unless the chancellor recommended it, Whitmire said he thought the regents might simply force the chancellor to cut Powers loose or be removed himself.

“If I had to vote now,” Whitmire said, “I’d vote no. I  don’t want to play any part in the removal of President Powers. I think you’re on a mission.”

Earlier in his remarks, Foster insisted that the Board has never seriously discussed firing Powers. They have had informal conversations about a transition, but not forced.

Foster said Powers had been a challenge to the board at times. How he was difficult or on what issues, Foster didn’t say. But he and the committee members found agreement in one respect: Foster, like the legislators, wanted the Powers fight to be over.

“We spend a lot of time talking about [Powers], and I think it’s a big distraction. I wish we could put it behind us.”

Hegar said a vote to confirm the nominees could come as early as Monday night.

In 2011, the book Academically Adrift: Limited Learning on College Campuses gripped the higher-ed world with an alarming argument: many college students, the authors asserted, aren’t really learning at all. Now two new studies are rebutting those findings.

In Academically Adrift, sociologists Richard Arum and Josipa Roksa analyzed years of data and found that 45 percent of U.S. undergraduates showed no significant improvement in the basic skills college is supposed to teach, like critical reasoning, thinking, and writing. The book’s indictment of academia was damning—and compelling. Academically Adrift has been called “the most important book on higher education in a decade.” It became a hotly debated topic among administrators and teachers across the country.

Higher-ed reformers have also used Adrift as ammunition in the debate over whether colleges should focus more on measuring productivity, slashing tuition, and favoring vocational preparation over the liberal arts. Activist Richard Vedder, who has argued that UT’s professors are unproductive, called Academically Adrift “a must-read.” And former UT lecturer Jeff Sandefer, whose “seven breakthrough solutions” fueled a continuing debate over whether colleges should be more like businesses, is also a fan.

Two new reports by Roger Benjamin, president of the Council for Aid to Education, present a different picture. Inside Higher Ed has a thorough explanation of how the studies’ methodologies differ. Overall, the new findings are much more optimistic than those from Adrift. Where Adrift found a 0.47 “effect size,” or a measure of how much students’ test scores improved from freshman to senior year, Benjamin found an effect size of 0.78—considered to be a significant difference. According to Benjamin, students do in fact significantly improve their critical thinking skills throughout college. “The notion that college doesn’t matter is inaccurate,” he told Inside Higher Ed.

It’s also worth noting that the Council for Aid to Education produces the Collegiate Learning Assessment, the standardized test upon which Academically Adrift relied heavily for measuring student learning.

Such big questions as how beneficial attending college is and how to measure its impact are unlikely to ever be resolved with a single set of studies. Benjamin has made clear that he didn’t intend his work as a takedown of Adrift, calling the new studies “a more nuanced story.” In an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education, he also made clear his belief that students are in fact learning: “College does have significant effects from freshman to graduating-senior levels,” Benjamin said.

Photo by dcJohn on Flickr.

The 130th Spring Commencement of The University of Texas at Austin was a bittersweet moment for the 8,358 students receiving their bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees.

Following two days of individual recognition by UT’s colleges and schools, the University-wide ceremony—held in the Main Mall on Saturday evening—marked the end of one journey, and the beginning of another.

Proud family members and friends weren’t deterred by new security measures put into place for this year’s event. UT officials estimate around 25,000 showed up to help celebrate the Class of 2013 and hear the keynote speech by former Longhorn Sanya Richards-Ross, ’02.

Once a member of UT’s track team, Richards-Ross is now an Olympic gold medal-winning runner and a proud Texas Ex. In her speech, she detailed her long, and often bumpy, road to success, and encouraged the graduating class to persevere—something that, she believes, shouldn’t be too difficult for UT grads.

“In our weight room it says, ‘The winning tradition of the Texas Longhorns will not be entrusted to the weak or timid,’” Richards-Ross said to the crowd. “I would dare say that isn’t just a slogan used to motivate athletes—it’s a slogan that truly represents the spirit of all Longhorns.”

And it’s that Longhorn spirit that truly threads the Class of 2013 together. When he took to the podium, President Bill Powers explained that this year’s graduates came from 66 countries, 48 states, and 158 Texas counties, and each had a very different path that led him or her to the Forty Acres.

Sanya Richards-Ross

Legendary Longhorn quarterback Vince Young’s path led him to UT—twice. After leaving the University to join the NFL in 2006, Young returned to campus this semester and took 19 hours in order to graduate. And, on his 30th birthday, he did—an accomplishment he told CBS Sports topped even winning a national championship.

As the fireworks popped and the number ’13′ glowed on the Tower above, Young and his fellow Longhorns stood, horns in the air, and officially made the transition from students to Texas Exes.

Earlier in the day, more than 3,900 students, family members, and friends flocked to the Etter-Harbin Alumni Center to enjoy champagne toasts and appearances by Bevo, Hook ‘Em, and Smokey the Cannon at The Great Texas Exit. And enjoy they did: 800 bottles of champagne, 1,300 cupcakes, and 3,500 cookies were consumed during the weekend’s festivities.

See photos and tweets from UT’s 130th Spring Commencement weekend in the Storify below! Can’t see the Storify? Click here.

Photos by Marsha Miller.

]]> http://alcalde.texasexes.org/2013/05/new-texas-exes-are-born-at-uts-130th-spring-commencement/feed/ 0 http://alcalde.texasexes.org/2013/05/powell-mccombs-and-the-fog-of-war/ http://alcalde.texasexes.org/2013/05/powell-mccombs-and-the-fog-of-war/#comments Fri, 17 May 2013 22:42:09 +0000 Tim Taliaferro http://alcalde.texasexes.org/?p=37590 As a new generation of Longhorns graduates, the mission of the Texas Exes is more important than ever. Even in times of controversy, our goal is to tell the story of UT—fairly and completely.  

It’s been a busy week in Texas higher education news, and as usual The University of Texas stands at the center. Two major stories from the last week warrant mention, beginning with a lengthy two-part Texas Monthly interview with Gene Powell, chairman of the UT Board of Regents.

Powell’s interview (Part One, Part Two) comes hot on the heels of an op-ed that ran in the Houston Chronicle under the byline of Red McCombs, the prominent University of Texas supporter from San Antonio and Distinguished Alumnus for whom the business school is named.

Both of these articles deserve the close attention of alumni and should be read in full, and in context.

The basic upshot of Powell’s 11,000-word interview and McCombs’ op-ed is that they believe the regents have been unfairly criticized and their accomplishments have gone overlooked in what Powell calls a “fog of war.” First, McCombs:

I am a UT-Austin alumnus and there are few things in life I am more passionate about than my alma mater. Believe me, if I thought there was a systematic effort to hurt the University in any way, I would be a most vocal defender. When I look at the level of support and funding the regents have provided to UT-Austin over the past several years, I am dumbfounded that this perception of conflict persists. What conflict?

Now, here’s the chairman talking about the board:

It’s a great story about a team that has changed how things are going to be done in America, and yet Texas and the nation don’t really know the story. They know all about the salacious things. They know about Bill Powers and the tension. But the story that we’re missing is that right here under our noses, we’re changing the face of higher education.

In the same interview, Powell suggests that since he became chairman back in 2011, the Texas Exes and its many prominent alumni have operated largely out of fear based on misplaced assumptions about what the regents may or may not be up to. Here’s the excerpt:

So I would say the very first thing that happened was a great deal of fear from alumni, and the administration, and the staff. This fear created a group of assumptions that everybody started to hypothesize about. “Here are these new regents. What are they going to do?” When I mentioned blended online learning, the first response was, “Well, the chairman wants to turn us into the University of Phoenix or make us a diploma mill. He’s going to cheapen the university by wanting more enrollment or lower tuition. He wants to separate teaching from research. He doesn’t like research. The board doesn’t like research. They’re going to do away with all research dollars for the arts or the humanities.” These are just samples of what happened. So we had this fear, we had these assumptions. People then started to email their friends, and the Texas Exes got in on it, and before long the assumptions became almost set in concrete.

The first point worth exploring here is that Powell believes the board has not been sufficiently recognized for its work. That may be true, but it cannot be said that the Texas Exes or Alcalde has ignored or minimized it. This magazine has published several articles relating to the UT-Austin medical school and the regents’ backing of it.  The announcement of their support for the UT-Austin medical school, we covered. The unveiling of the plans, we covered. And the approval of those plans, we also covered. The Texas Exes even launched a campaign in support of Proposition 1, the Travis County ballot initiative that helped make the medical school possible. In his September 2012 column kicking off the effort and urging alumni to support it, Texas Exes president John Beckworth praised the regents for their “far-sighted investment” in the medical school. And a video we produced in support of the medical school highlighted the regents’ commitment to making it happen.

When the regents announced their support for $105 million in matching money to help build the new Engineering Education and Research Center at UT-Austin, our headline read: “Regents Step In to Help Fund New Engineering Center.” The Texas Exes made the EERC one of its five legislative priorities and has since mobilized hundreds of alumni during the 83rd Legislative session to help persuade legislators to make a capital investment in it. The third pillar of financial support for the EERC is private philanthropy, and the Texas Exes is supporting engineering dean Greg Fenves in his quest to raise the money.

The second point worth mentioning here is Powell’s claim that the Texas Exes has operated out of fear, and that we have allowed or perhaps even promoted rumors about the board’s intentions without asking what they really were. Before his interview with Texas Monthly, Powell had done one equivalent question-and-answer article in the previous two years—it was in this magazine in January 2012. We asked Powell our questions, and we published his answers.

The chairman acknowledges that there is and has been widespread concern about the regents and what they are up to. Over the past three years, students, alumni, faculty, previous members of the UT System board and administration, and most recently Texas legislators have voiced publicly their reservations about the perceived direction in which the regents are taking UT-Austin and how they are managing the campus. The explanation he offers is that people have bad information. But it’s possible that bad information is not what’s to blame. Equally plausible is that these groups, all of whom have a vested interest in the future of UT, don’t have enough information or find the info they do have unpersuasive. According to a recent article in the San Antonio Express-News, UT students would like more information from the System. And state Sen. Judith Zaffirini, a longtime champion of UT-Austin, has expressed frustration with the System for failing to respond to requests for information, one of which she submitted two years ago.

It’s certainly true that the regents have shown great financial support of UT-Austin at a time when the System’s coffers are at record highs. That is both commendable and much appreciated by anyone who wants UT-Austin to succeed. But advancing the mission is about more than just financial support. According to many longtime UT observers, some board members maintain a confrontational posture toward UT-Austin. Ongoing demands for data (in violation of the gentleman’s agreement Powell mentions was reached with the Framework), a scrutinizing of the Campaign for Texas, and an investigation into nonprofit organizations that support the campus all contribute to a general feeling of animosity from the regents toward the campus. Rep. Jim Pitts worries the regents are on “witch hunts” to oust President Powers. Faculty members have long memories, and though Powell doesn’t mention Rick O’Donnell, the former UT System consultant who labeled the majority of UT-Austin faculty as “coasters” and “dodgers,” it is a wound that’s yet to heal.

The regents may well deserve more attention and appreciation than they have gotten. And people may well stand to have more information about what’s going on. The Texas Exes and the Alcalde are committed to doing both.

If there’s a fog of war, as the chairman suggests, our interest is in dispelling it.

Scott Braddock writes about Texas politics for Quorum Report. He is also an avid tweeter. Hear what he has to say about the 83rd Legislative session as it comes roaring to a close.

You can subscribe to the UT Advocates podcast on iTunes.

Learn more about Texas Exes advocacy efforts here.

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“In most instances, it really isn’t about the degree,” says Texas Exes Career Services director Jennifer Duncan. “All too often, job-seekers focus on their degree, past jobs, or company names, and not enough on what employers really want to know.”

So how can you sell your skills and convince employers that you’ll bring value to the company? You’ll need to identify your transferable skills and why they matter. To start, Duncan offers three quick tips:

1. Analyze your accomplishments. Your résumé probably already includes bullet points listing your past achievements—now ask yourself what skills got you there. If you exceeded sales goals, for example, did superior organization and project management contribute to that? Maybe your fluency in a particular software program helped you save money for the company. Identify your top three skills and practice giving examples of each.

2. Ask a professional in your field. Information sessions, or informal interviews with professionals in your field, are designed to help you improve your job-search strategy. Reach out to a contact on LinkedIn or through the Texas Exes Alumni Directory and ask to get coffee. Then ask, “What skills have been most useful to you? What are managers in your field looking for?”

3. Explore LinkedIn. You may have a LinkedIn profile, but did you know about the site’s nifty skills tool? Type in the name of a skill and the site will provide stats on how common it is, whether it’s growing or shrinking, and which companies are closely related to it, among other detailed results. Most useful, Duncan says, is the capability to browse real users’ LinkedIn profiles to see how they’re describing their skills. Learn your industry’s lingo and preferences and factor that into your application.

“Recruiters are looking for examples of how you performed well in the past,” Duncan says, “as well as how you’ll apply those skills to the new position.” If you can nail that part of the interview, you’re well on your way to landing the job.

Photo by Victor1558 on Flickr.