Des Moines Register
07-15-06
Doak: Think big about universities
RICHARD DOAK
REGISTER COLUMNIST
So Iowa State University wants to spend $135 million on athletic facilities in
hopes it will propel the school into the elite ranks of college sports.
It’s nice that somebody at the state universities is capable of thinking big. Too
bad it’s just in the athletic departments.
Not that there’s anything wrong with wanting to be among the best in football and
basketball. Especially as an ISU graduate, I’d like to see the Cyclones regularly
competing for national championships the way some other Big 12 schools do.
Besides, athletic facilities are financed mostly by donations and admission fees,
not tax money, so there’s nothing to complain about — except that the state
doesn’t have a similar urge to think big about other aspects of the universities.
Why, for instance, isn’t ISU’s Center for Sustainable Environmental Technologies
so generously funded that the whole world turns to ISU for energy answers? This
would do more to make Iowa a center of emerging energy technologies than,
say, more subsidies for ethanol.
Or why has Iowa never welded the research capabilities of its three universities
together, the way North Carolina did with its Research Triangle?
In addition to the universities, the public and the Legislature need to think big,
too. Instead of begrudging every dollar spent on the universities, why doesn’t the
Legislature insist that the universities become the best in certain non-athletic
endeavors, and eagerly provide sufficient appropriations to make it happen?
Having elite athletic programs would be fun, but having elite programs in selected
science, engineering and academic fields would be better — and do more for the
state’s economy in the long run.