Michael J. Hogan became the 14th president
of the University of Connecticut just as the new
academic year began in September. An American
diplomacy scholar, he previously served as executive vice president and provost at the University of Iowa and as executive dean of the Colleges of Arts and
Sciences at The Ohio State University.
He discussed his new role with UCONN magazine.
What attracted you to UConn?
I have known about UConn for years, in part through emeritus professor Tom Paterson, a very close colleague who taught in the University’s history department. Of course, UConn’s academic reputation has just been soaring over the last decade, so I have learned about UConn in that sense and in many academic circles.
The state of Connecticut and its taxpayers have been very good to the University of Connecticut; they are proud of their investment and the dividends that investment has paid. This notion has been reinforced when I spoke with Governor Rell, state legislators, donors and alumni as well. They’re very proud of UConn’s rise in prominence—rightfully so.
You’ve been a change agent as a department head, dean and provost. How will you approach having overarching responsibility as UConn president?
As president, you are the principal architect of the University’s future. You have a chance to set the agenda; you are the primary advocate for the institution and the public face to our many constituencies. I will be a visible president who is active on our campuses with students and with faculty.
My desire to become a university president is consistent with my academic aspirations: I identify with the core mission of teaching, research and service. My motivation for becoming an academic administrator, including president, was the opportunity to foster environments in which teachers, scholars and students can excel in their work.
You’ve stated previously that rankings are important. How so?
Rankings are a benchmark of our performance as a university. There are different rankings, but for many people, including students, parents and alums, U.S.News & World Report is the gold standard; it’s the ranking that most people look to first.
None of these rankings measures everything that’s important, certainly not everything that would be important to me or to the University of Connecticut. But what is measured is important and is indicative of what we would be tracking even if there weren’t a U.S.News & World Report ranking.
It’s important to know our student retention rate, our graduation rate, peer recognition of our faculty and the level of support we have from alumni. We have one of the highest alumni giving rates in the country at 24 percent; that’s an incredible statistic.
These things tell us not only how we’re doing compared to peer institutions but also how well we’re performing against our own goals.
How can we improve our ranking and reputation, and what role will alumni play?
We have improved our ranking among public universities over the years, from 38 to 24; however, moving up into the top 20 will be a greater challenge.
There’s plenty of work ahead of us, and alumni assistance will be critical. If we look at our rank among public universities, our peer group is no longer just New England schools. We’re now competing on a national stage.
To compete, we need to have many more highly rated graduate programs, and we have to beef up our research portfolio. We need to have more research dollars, especially sponsored federal research invested in the University. It’s important for our alumni to understand and be supportive of where we want to go and what it’s going to take to achieve these goals.
What’s important is that our alums maintain their identity and engagement with UConn. To the extent that we proceed on our current upward trajectory, not only will the students of today and the alums of tomorrow be walking out of here with a degree that’s much more valuable, so too will all UConn alumni.
How do you make these changes to elevate UConn’s academic profile without alienating alumni?
Part of the evolution of a university is the continued cultivation of new traditions and aspirations of greater achievements building on the past. As a historian, I’m fascinated with understanding change over time.
This isn’t the same university it was when many of our current alumni were here 20, 30 and 40 years ago. Every generation of students and faculty, and every university president, stands on the shoulders of those who came before.
We can be better today because a decade or two ago the students who were here were better than those who came before they did, just as those students were in the years before that.
You’ve discussed the importance of private support for public universities in your previous writings. What role will private support play in UConn’s future?
Public universities in New England were among the last to do what private universities have done since their inception — that is raise private funds to support the university. That’s the margin of support that separates a good university from a great university.
It’s important for our friends, our donors and alums to understand that we won’t be as good as they want us to be and that we won’t be able to continue our climb to the ranks of truly great public universities nationwide unless we get substantial increases in private support.
Let’s look at scholarships. All qualified students should be able to attend, regardless of their family’s financial capacity. We have to be able to help them in other ways. Partly we help them by going to alumni and friends to raise funds for need-based and merit-based scholarships.
Private support, which includes our growing endowment, will not replace tuition or state support as a primary revenue stream, but it will add the margin of excellence needed for us to achieve our goals.
How does UConn’s partnership with the private sector help the state’s economic growth?
UConn is a land grant institution. As such, we’re in partnership with the state and the private sector. Those partnerships are critical because they help to generate revenue for us and growth for the state. We have an interest in helping the state grow economically, and we’ll share in the benefit of that growth.
UConn attracts high-achieving students and educates, motivates and prepares them to enter the professional positions that stimulate Connecticut’s economy. We also support the state economy by commercializing intellectual property we cultivate or in collaboration with groups in the commercial sector who can take what we have developed and start new businesses.
Diversity on campus has been a priority in your previous positions. How will your leadership at UConn reflect that?
It is going to expand, I promise you that. If we do not more fully immerse our students in diversity, we’re not educating them to live in the 21st century. We’ve done a very good job at UConn, particularly promoting diversity among students.
We haven’t been as fortunate in diversifying the faculty ranks. That will be part of the new academic strategic plan. I’ll be looking at ways to increase diversity in faculty, and we’re going to have benchmarks toward progress. We’re going to assess our progress annually and move resources to support our goals.
You are a globalization advocate. Is there a need to rethink higher education, particularly undergraduate preparation, in the context of a global age?
Our students, whether they stay in Connecticut or not, will be working in a global economy. As such, we must prepare them. Their lives, their professional careers, will be impacted by developments all over the world — whether it’s war, oil shortages, migration flows, the rapid movement of money and currency or the development of multinational corporations — that’s just part of globalization. That’s why educational institutions have to be interested in globalization, ininternationalizing curriculum and in the issue of diversity.
But this question gives me an opportunity to raise a related and important, even controversial, issue which is that the era of abundance in higher education is behind us. In the new world, the future belongs to public universities that do two things — find sources of revenue to supplement what they’re receiving from the state and, second, are guided by three very important words — focus, focus, focus.
The future belongs to universities that establish academic priorities and invest strategically in those areas. We need to have a strategic plan and an academic focus that identifies our key priorities, and we have to mobilize resources to support the success of those programs. This does not mean that you are shortchanging other efforts. But it does mean you are making difficult strategic choices that have to be made in an era of scarce resources.
With health care as a major part of the economy and as a national concern, what special issues will be faced by the UConn Health Center?
The UConn Health Center is a significant advantage to the University. The Schools of Medicine and Dental Medicine and the basic science programs at the Health Center are the source of about half of the sponsored research dollars that come into the University.
The clinical activities also are crucial to innovation on the educational side, as well as to the future of translational research. In short, the health and well-being of the medical school, dental school and John Dempsey Hospital are very important to me and to the future of the University and the state of Connecticut.
Any final thoughts for our readers?
The further we go up in the rankings, the more value we bring to the state of Connecticut and to the students who come through our doors. This is not about me as president. This is about the big-shouldered mission of the University to serve the state and the citizens of Connecticut by promoting its social, cultural and economic well-being and graduating generation after generation of educated citizens who will make contributions throughout our state, all over the country and the world.
That’s something to be proud of. In the short time I have been at UConn, I’ve listened carefully to many of our students, faculty and staff, alumni, donors and state leaders. It is clear to me that Connecticut residents appreciate what we’re doing at UConn, and I am confident that our friends and alumni will help us move forward.