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I agree with President Sweet that this vision is long overdue. As a participant in Governor Strickland's initiative to improve public education for K-12 students, I am reassured that Ohio will have a better education system and economic future. President Lefton and his colleagues are to be commended for their dedication to this effort.

Yeah, right, Ms. Griffin;

I'd gladly give Doc Lefton the benefit of the doubt, being the "new kid on the block", in this endeavor; however, if the parochial history of our Universities' past administrations is any indication, Msrs. Proenza, Sweet and Cartwright(Lefton) would only be "dragged, kicking and screaming" to the table now set before them as has been mandated by Governor Strickland and Mr. Fingerhut and characterized by the recent Akron Beacon Journal editorial by Steve Hoffman:

"With the chicken-or-egg debate ebbing, the next item on the agenda is how, exactly, to go about rebuilding public higher education to get the desired results.

What Fingerhut has in mind is a hybrid approach. Instead of forcing the establishment of a fully unified system, he has in mind incentives that will move existing institutions (each with its own board of trustees and president) away from competing and overlapping programs and toward a more coherent whole.

No one should underestimate the size of this task. Ohio is a diverse state without a single, dominant city or region, so it tends toward fragmentation. But besides being on the winning side of the chicken-or-egg debate, Fingerhut does have some traction to move ahead. He has the governor, who makes appointments to university boards of trustees all over the state, on his side. And, if he can succeed in changing the funding system for higher education from one based almost entirely on enrollment to one based on rewards for meeting specific goals, he will gain financial leverage."


While I don't have Mr. Fingerhut's most current characterization of our region's University Presidents' parochial behavior, I believe it went something like "The best interest of NEUOCOM has not been realized through the makeup of it's current Board of Trustees."

So let's hear it, Doc Lefton. Try earning your outrageous bonus for a change by making a change, eh? The State has made it clear that the institutionalized administrative-policy-wonk-staus-quo in effect upon your arrival to Northeast Ohio is no longer acceptable.

Give 'em steel, son!

Yes he's on a mission to improve higher education, a goal driven by his history. To help ensure quality and accountability, a key action step is the participation of all universities in the Voluntary System of Accountability, which makes data available regarding price, financial aid, degree programs, success, retention, campus safety, future plans of graduates, student satisfaction and student learning outcomes.

Regards,
Marry hall

And the Board of Directors of NEOUCOM were relieved of their duties by Chancellor Fingerhut because they weren't "serving the best interests of NEUOCOM"...who'd have thunk it, eh, Doc Sweet/Perenza/Lefton???

So much for any "consensus" by a bunch of parochial administrative-policy-wonks, eh?