Today, I am sorry to say, I don't believe that UC is as good a university as it was then, and it definitely does not seem to retain the local support that it did.

Now some might jump to the conclusion that this drop in stature and esteem is a direct result of my being here. While such an accusation might result primarily as the normal reaction from the caustic and critical attitude that some of our colleagues seem to have to any criticism, it is also something with which I would partially agree. While I have been active in various aspects of university governance during my career at UC, I have not done enough and have not been as effective as I should been. But it is not just me. In general, faculty participation in university governance, an important area of faculty responsibility, has not been as effective as it should be. And because of this, the university is experiencing several serious deficiencies.

As a result, some would claim that the University of Cincinnati is not a good university. While this might or might not be true, I do believe that those of us who have had a long involvement with UC will generally agree that it is not as good a university as it was. The reasons for this are:

A lack of effective leadership
A lack of tolerance, especially for diverse points of views
A lack of self esteem
A lack of effective management

I first came to Cincinnati in the spring of 1965 to interview for a teaching position. Shortly after finishing graduate school, although I was teaching part-time at Harvard, assisting my former professor and then current employer, I was intent on practicing architecture. Then out of the blue, I received two offers to teach.

I remember talking with my wife, conveying how good it felt to receive such an offer, but also expressing my concern over whether or not I could meet the challenge. After some thought, I realized that two options were available to me. Since I was rather vociferous in criticizing my own educational experience, I could either accept the challenge to try to do better or shut-up and stop my complaining. So off we came to Cincinnati.

The other offer to teach was from RISD. Having grown up in Providence, I was not anxious to return. Also my wife, being a New Yorker and not interested in succumbing to my family's influence, refused to move there.

You might ask why she agreed to Cincinnati. Well, she agreed since I promised her it would be for only 2 years. We also both felt that it would be good for us and our relationship if we broke, or at least loosened, family ties by leaving the east coast for awhile.

Remember, to an easterner, especially a New Yorker, beyond the Hudson is a vast waste land with very little until you get to California, which was just a bit beyond Cincinnati.

More importantly, I wanted to come to Cincinnati because I was impressed with the faculty whom I met during my interview. While I knew something about the quality of the UC architecture program, what really impressed me was that there was a team of faculty, jointly committed to doing the best they could. Without any presumptions of being special or exceptional, they were merely committed to as well as they could, and I wanted to work with them and help as best as I could.

Interestingly, one of the other things that I remember from this first UC encounter was my interview with the central administration, more specifically, my interview with Hoke Greene. Dr. Greene spent our time together convincing me that Cincinnati was a good place to live and assuring me that UC had a wonderful retirement program. (This didn't impressed me very much then, and in fact it kind of put me off - remember, I was only considering a 2 year commitment and I was only in my mid-20's.)

Anyway, we came to Cincinnati, and obviously our commitment has been for a little longer that we expected. Cincinnati is our home, and the University of Cincinnati is an institution to which I am indebted. But it is also an institution that is disappointing me more and more as time passes.

When I came here, UC was a municipal university. It was proud of its heritage, of its local ties, and of its social responsibilities. It was a pretty good mid-western university with some programs that excelled nationally and some even internationally. The faculty worked hard, doing what had to be done. While many of us were primarily committed to the classroom, others were more involved in scholarship and research. Although we didn't always agree among ourselves or with the administration, there seemed to be mutual respect and a general level of cordiality that supported us all.

Unfortunately, times have changed. While the hype about how good we are seems to have increased, I'm not certain that the claims are really justified. While there are a number of excellent programs and many good ones, overall, the quality is not that good. And while the faculty are generally committed, dedicated and creative teachers, scholars, and researchers, they are not as productive and effective as a collaborative body as perhaps they should be. And this is critical, for the university is the faculty. But the faculty are not happy. Their morale is low, and their commitment to UC seems to diminish every year.

While individual excellence is important, and does exist, the university requires a collaboration - a community that works collectively. And the academic community includes not only faculty, but students as well.

Now, I should clarify that I am not part of what most would accept as a traditional academic discipline. I should also restate that I never actually intended on spending my professional career as an educator.

While I have participated in scholarship and have been engaged in various research projects during my academic tenure, in addition to having spent time in architectural practice, I have never been primarily devoted to extending the knowledge based, other than in terms of increasing my students' understanding and appreciation.

But now, such a focus and commitment does not seem acceptable. Rather, faculty must be driven by the search for their next seminal contribution to their discipline. Recognizing that some individuals are, in fact, able to make a number of original, significant contributions to their field during their career, this is rather rare. More likely, achieving one seminal idea in a lifetime is quite an accomplishment!

However, today it seems that young faculty members are expected to make a major contribution to their particular discipline simply to get re-appointed, to say nothing about being tenured or promoted. And often the administrators demanding this are without any illustrious credentials of their own.

When perspective faculty members are interviewed today, they are not told about the wonderful retirement program that UC has — [actually with STERS rather than TIAA-CREF, UC doesn't have a very good retirement program]. Rather, they are told what they must accomplish in order to be accepted into the UC community - and generally they are told this by somebody they have never heard about in terms of having made a major disciplinary contribution.

While there are obvious exceptions, generally there is more hype than substance, and, as a result, a general level of mistrust and exaggeration is established. Faculty who use to be willing to engaged in discussion on various ideas are "advised" to avoid exposing their limitations, their questions, their doubts since they must impress their colleagues when it comes time for re-appointment. It’s one-upmanship, or, in street talk, it’s a pissing contest.

A community where inquiry was revered, where the question was sometimes more important than the answer, has been replaced with a community that prefers to assert authority, even if not substantiated.

UC is suffering from a lack of confidence, from a lack of tolerance, from a lack of leadership and from a lack of effective management.

This summer we have had the opportunity to observe an extraordinary feat — 70 home runs in one season! I am not a baseball fan, but I can’t help but be impressed with Mark McGuire’s athletic accomplishment, but probably I am more moved by his demeanor and his humility, and that of his competitor Sammy Sousa. Neither of these individuals bothered to tell us how good they were, neither of them grandstanded, they merely did what they did, and did it very well. No bragging, no hyperbole — but some accomplishment!

For the last few years, there has been a concerted effort on what is called the "Just Community." Some of you might remember the "Friendliest Campus in Ohio" campaign from around 15 or 20 years ago. But while we keep hearing about making UC a more Just Community, there seems to be a particular model of "justness" that we are to follow. For example, which happened again this summer, we had the dress code incident when faculty were told what attire is acceptable.

But more than tolerating differences in what we wear, the university needs to allow, maybe even encourage, alternative points of view, various values, different opinions. We need to appreciate difference rather than force conformity.

While the UC faculty tends to be a peculiar lot, including many non-conformists, we still need guidance if we are to work together effectively. But guidance comes from support and from help. It comes from leadership that provides positive motivation and encouragement. While threats and criticism might cause change, generally the results from the stick are not as constructive or effective as that from the carrot. We need leadership, not control.

While some might talk about the lack of leadership at UC, others seem to focus more on the management model that the administration seems to want to follow. While the management model might be inappropriate to run a university, I also feel that if such a model were executed better we might not object to it so much.

As AAUP, as well as 925, continues to negotiate for a reasonable wage package, we are told that the university has some serious financial problems that make this impossible. But why? Why can’t we do what others Ohio schools are able to do? Why do we have a $7 million budgetary burden resulting from reductions in graduate enrollment? Why weren’t we aware of the full costs to the university resulting from the change in the hospital? Why, if we have such financial problems, are we spending almost $1/2 million to build a sign at the corner of Clifton and MLK? Why do we need to build a new office building, using General Funds, when we recently built the Edwards Building, which was supposedly intended for those offices and to be paid for with the same revenues? Why are we spending General Funds money to underwrite the construction of a hotel when we can’t seem to find the resources to build adequate teaching space for A&S?

How can we be a good university if we don’t adequately support our Liberal Arts college?

While I do believe that there is a lack of effective management, perhaps rather than management, we should be talking about effective university governance — a model of operation in which the various segments of the university collectively consider matters of concern, explore alternatives, and decide appropriate actions. Perhaps we need to get faculty more involved in governing the university while the administration concentrates more on administering rather than dictating.