32 Campus Drive, University Hall 221
Missoula, MT 59812
October 2, 2015
Royce C. Engstrom and Perry J. Brown,
University of Montana
Dear President Engstrom and Provost Brown
Many thanks for the request to discuss the work of the Academic Alignment and Innovation Program
(AAIP) Task Force. As the Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate, we write in an effort to capture
the spirit of conversation both on the floor of the Senate and elsewhere.
We are very grateful for the work conducted by the Task Force and want to recognize the care and
wisdom displayed under Professor Ware’s leadership. Last year, ECOS worked hard to enable broad
faculty involvement in the composition of the Task Force. Andrew’s team was diligent, judicious, and
sustained in their efforts. It was a necessary conversation and one that the Task Force conducted to
involve many sectors of the University. The Task Force itself had good representation, many voices, and
good perspectives. They then engaged many faculty, Deans, and program leads in discussion. We
commend them for their success in bringing the campus to focus on our suite of academic programs,
their status and their relevancy going forward.
The Task Force identified programs in three categories (ready for growth, new, and challenged) that all
deserve more conversation. It could be said that there were no real surprises in those categories, but
this, too, is a reflection of the inclusive and engaging process that the Task Force used in its work. Many
of the ready-to-grow category have already been noted and recognized as such, and some have already
received recognition and/or funds through various initiatives, such as being named a Program of
National Distinction. Similarly, some of the new programs are already being developed, reviewed, and
refined, possibly with added support and resources for that process. The challenged programs, too, are
receiving attention in their units, along with some assistance, with an eye to potential retooling. The
lists of ready for growth programs, new programs, and programs having unique opportunities indicate
some of the current strengths of this campus. About a third of these programs could be classified as
belonging to the biomedical and health sciences, while several others involve the environment. Several
of the new programs are already in development, which perhaps illustrates the expertise, capacity and
enthusiasm that already exists on this campus.
Of course, many of the academic programs that fell “in the middle” and didn’t make one of these three
categories are successful, important, and worthy of attention, support, and resources. Many of these
programs are well known nationally and internationally, produce high-quality graduates of our
University, and represent the shared talents of our faculty, students, staff, and administration. We also
note that many of the successful academic programs that didn’t make the “ready-for-growth” category
not only make important and necessary educational contributions to those “ready-for-growth”
programs, but are also key components of the University’s interdisciplinary, international, and online
programs.
We fully recognize that this is the start of a longer campus conversation. There is a common desire to
know more information about what our campus does and should be offering in the way of academic
programs. The more we know what we, collectively, are working on and towards, and the more
transparent the basis is upon which academic programming developments and decisions are being
made, the stronger we feel the University can become. We also recognize that given the data and Task
Force-initiated questions, many Deans and program leads are continuing to identify what might be
constraining enrollments, and how more investments of time and resources can best be made.
It is not clear that an AAIP Implementation group would be much more informed than the original Task
Force. There is a definite wariness from some faculty to being involved in such a group, partially
because they would likely not want to be seen as agents of reductions or reassigning of resources. (We
do note that section 18.500 Retrenchment of the UM Contractual Bargaining Agreement has procedures
for a Review Committee to consider documentation that includes, but is not limited to, references to
program duplication, quality, and productivity.) But, perhaps more importantly, even well-informed
faculty may not feel that they fully understand the full suite of UM’s academic offerings or the “bigger
picture” of how the various academic programs fit together. Individual program leads and individual
Deans may well have a strong sense of activity, of what is working well, and where the best strategic
investments may be made. Still, faculty seek full engagement in these issues. While difficult at the
campus-wide level, productive academic conversations can be had at the unit, college and school level.
There is still much to be learned and understood without the charge of picking winners and losers. In
particular, the recognition of specific industry and societal trends are a strength of faculty, unit, and
college leadership. We are in frequent conversation and engagement with our various external
partners and cooperators through our teaching, research, and outreach activities. Faculty and unit
leaders also have the perspective of long-term patterns and may be somewhat resistant to urgent
demands that can turn out to be “passing fancies.” Still, campus-wide conversations surrounding broad
strategic questions are very welcome and worthwhile, since they are without the need to delve deeply
into the specifics of programs.
The campus conversation around liberal arts and sciences education, online classes, and interdisciplinary
programs are all very important. Faculty expressed the foundational importance of a broad liberal arts
and sciences education to this campus. This is our heritage and our strength. Students, faculty, and
employers all value the flexible, critical and informed thinkers that that foundation helps
provide. Those students go on to be articulate and persuasive, ready for the challenges of future
studies and our society. Our comments here are not limited to those who graduate from traditional
programs in the arts and sciences, but also to the many programs that rely upon that broad foundation
in the arts and sciences. The skills and commitments to learning, citizenship, and human creativity are
equally valued by many of the technical and specialized programs. In particular, we note that the liberal
arts and sciences make substantial contributions to the international and inter-disciplinary efforts of our
campus. We look forward to the October 26-27 conference, Defining a 21st Century Education for a
Vibrant Democracy, as well the continued strategic work of the Internationalization Lab. That effort
(iLab) demonstrates the time, effort, and commitment that it takes to advance a distinct academic
agenda in the international context and perhaps serves as a model of process that might also be used
for online education, interdisciplinary programming, and perhaps even the General Education program
itself. Such an effort might also clarify academic oversight of online and inter-disciplinary programming.
We have also come to appreciate the interconnectedness of UM’s academic programs. The AAIP Task
Force may not have had the opportunity fully to investigate this, particularly with the excellent programby-program review they conducted. However, there are many links and co-dependencies between the
various academic programs, and a reductive breakdown by program makes that hard, by definition, to
see. We have overlapping curriculum, with many flourishing programs that include courses from, say,
challenged programs. We rely upon one another’s courses, and many of our successful programs are
interdisciplinary. There is also a link between undergraduate and graduate offerings – TA’s are
essential recruiting and resourcing tools for graduate programs, but are clearly tied to the instructional
needs of undergraduate programs. Similarly, some graduate programs are inter-twined between
teaching and research capacity. For instance, many highly successful research doctoral programs have
‘feeder’ programs at the Masters level. We acknowledge that it is much harder to measure and monitor
the inputs and outputs of these interconnected and inter-disciplinary programs.
In part, because of this interconnected nature of UM’s academic programs, we do not wish to pit liberal
arts and sciences education against the programs of the technical and professional schools. It would be
easy to see support of one as a weakening of another. Similarly, we recognize a tension between shortterm funding (perhaps of new initiatives) versus a long-term commitment towards strong, core
activities. In considering some of the comments of “challenged” programs, we have heard suggestion
that short-term fluctuations don’t accurately indicate the long-term need for a particular program.
The limitations of any data collection effort needs to be acknowledged. The data compiled and
considered by AAIP didn’t make the decisions, but merely served as an alert for the Task Force to engage
the programs, chairs and deans in a conversation. The data provides only a snapshot, perhaps of a
peculiar time period. While there will always be a desire for better data, better metrics, and better
comparisons with comparative schools (checking in how are we doing, how are we distinctive), we can
also sound a note of caution that data about the very diverse programs at UM will always be
limited. Any decision about what data are collected (and over which time periods) will always favor
some programs over others. Overall, more data (different, not necessarily better) might not make much
difference but may become yet another burden for our programs and faculty (at least if data needs to
be collected and reported at the program level).
We believe AAIP has initiated some very important conversations regarding the portfolio of academic
programs that UM will carry into the future, and we look forward to being fully engaged in those
conversations.
Sincerely,
Bill Borrie
John Kenneth DeBoer
Forestry & Conservation Theatre & Dance
Mary-Ann Bowman
Social Work
Michael S. Mayer
History
Nikolaus Vonessen
Mathematical Sciences
James W. Sears
Geosciences
Larry Howell
Law