So What Do Yall Think of the New President?

Asked a friend at UDub this yesterday. "He didn't seem to get in the way - so that's a massive start at the UW"

My thoughts are:
1. He isn't a Texas Insider who got the job because of his connections. He has actual, real qualifications for the job he has secured.
2. He showed an inclination to make UW competitive and not a degree mill.
3. He has to be supportive of athletics. I once heard Robert Sloan at Baylor (ok, not big time athletics) say that the downfall of his presidency started on the football field when Kevin Steele's gaffe came against UNLV, and Sloan didn't fire him at the end of that season. Young knows how important athletics are to perception, alumni support, and national reputation. He will maintain our commitment to athletics.

My gut tells me that it was a great hire.

I like what I have seen so far but it's hard to really know. He's obviously an outsider and his claim to fame is going after research dollars and knowing how to work a budget. He's a lawyer which is a little different background. I don't make much of the Mormon thing other than a very general statement that most Mormons are fairly conservative and family oriented which would mesh with our school culturally. The renovation of UW's stadium happened on his watch so that shows he had a commitment to athletics to some degree and they hired Chris Peterson from Boise which was certainly a coup.

Sounds like he is taking the job for opportunity and he likes the larger budgets he will have to work with here which is quite a statement when you are talking about UW as a fellow AAU member with a $2.8 Billion Endowment.

I'm optimistic.

BTW, here is a good article on him:

UW loses its top Dawg

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“I’m as surprised as you are — we didn’t have an inkling,” said Kate O’Neill, chair of the UW Faculty Senate and a law-school professor. She and others praised Young for his leadership, his ability to compromise and his commitment to faculty excellence.

But Young also had his share of critics, who say he has been aloof and distant, failed to develop a good relationship with state lawmakers and seemed uncomfortable and out of place in liberal Seattle. A Harvard-trained lawyer, Young once clerked for the late William Rehnquist, the conservative Supreme Court chief justice.

Young has played a pivotal role in a dispute with Washington State University over that school’s desire to build its own medical school in Spokane. Sixty-five state legislators have sponsored a bill that would clear the way for WSU to build a medical school, which some see as a political failure on Young’s part.

But Sen. David Frockt, D-Seattle, a member of the Senate’s Higher Education Committee, said Young was a strong advocate for higher education, and pushed the Legislature for funding contributions to start new science and technology scholarships for low- and moderate-income students. Young also pursued the idea of allowing institutions to set their own tuitions, Frockt said.

“I don’t think the Legislature or the public is there yet,” Frockt said. “But he made the point strongly that if we wanted to hold the line on tuition, we needed to put more dollars into higher education. I think he struck a good balance.”

Those closest to Young said he had a slow start in Seattle, and his wife, Marti — the two were married shortly after he was named president — was not happy here at first.

In 2013, the first year he was eligible for a raise, Young received a 4 percent salary boost, and regents gave him a tepid review, describing his performance as “solid.” But in October 2014, Young received a 6.2 percent salary increase, and the regents described him as performing “at exceptional levels by virtually any measure.”

List of accomplishments

During his tenure here, Young pushed for the creation of Startup Hall, a business incubator with rentable space, now operating on the second floor of a former UW law-school building. He has emphasized the importance of commercialization at the UW — taking ideas and discoveries and turning them into marketable products. He led the effort to create an online-degree program that allows state residents who never finished a bachelor’s degree to finish their credits at the UW.

Under his tenure, the UW rebuilt Husky Stadium by raising private money and boosting ticket prices, and opened new residence halls, remaking the west side of campus. And in the last few years, the UW set new records for the amount of private money it raised.

Startup Hall was “one of the things I was most excited about,” said Adam Sherman, a former student leader who now works at the UW’s Evans School of Public Affairs. “If he stayed longer, I think he could have done more projects like that, leaving behind something that benefitted not only Seattle but all of Washington state.”

Still, Sherman said he had a distinct difference of opinion on Young’s overarching mission.

“My feeling is that it’s important to have public support for a public university, and I would have liked to see more emphasis on that,” Sherman said. “But he thought his time was best invested in cultivating relationships with business groups and philanthropy. There wasn’t really a meeting of the minds.”

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He led the effort to create an online-degree program that allows state residents who never finished a bachelor’s degree to finish their credits at the UW.

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This is encouraging. I know many folks are afraid of becoming the University of Phoenix, but online-education is a big part of the future.

I wouldn't make anything of the "He's from California" thing. Ronald Reagan was from California too. If anything it sounds like he didn't fit well with the liberal UW/Seattle culture which is a fit for us. I also like that he seems very research and business focused. I'd love to see A&M get more engaged with startups and make B/CS in to more of a business town, really no reason it shouldn't be with the volume of grads and the location combined with the cost of living. Just need to encourage companies to have a presence there and then let it grow.

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I've always felt that A&M has a such strong fabric and community that if someone in a position like president doesn't fit, we will weed him/her out pretty quick.

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That was a MESS last time it happened. I don't see that process as a beneficial one. Talk about things I would love to know more about, now that the 100 Year Decision is on Amazon the biggest Aggie mystery to me is the whole Murano situation. Wish would could get a book on that one, but we don't like to air our dirty laundry so I expect to stay in the dark.

I am willing to give our new leader a chance, and I do like his resume. I mean who am I kidding, I am just so happy its not Rick this guy starts on a good foot with me.

Big thumbs up.

I won't know until I hear some sort of foresight about how to handle the massive change our University is about to take with 25 by 25.

That just makes me think he's a slimeball.

Graduated with honors from Harvard Law.

Was the lead lawyer and contract writer to unify Germany



Not bad