Interview with a Bobcat

I'm taking a fantastic elective called Higher Education Governance and Policy this semester; it's all about college presidents and administration and how university systems affect students, and vice versa (yes, I'm a big higher ed. nerd). The class is co-taught by two professors; one, Dr. Holub, was chancellor (president, basically) at UMass Amherst, and is now a professor of Germanic language at OSU. The other is the inimitable Dr. Strayhorn, a professor of Higher Ed. at OSU (check out his TEDx talk last year!)

Our midterm for the class was (what else) to interview a college or university president. I had high hopes of interviewing a female university president to talk about women's issues, but unfortunately couldn't get on anyone's calendar. As time ticked by, I decided to return (figuratively) to my alma mater and interview the president of Ohio University, Dr. Roderick McDavis.

When I was at OU, there were mixed feelings about Dr. McDavis; the typical battle between athletics funding and academic funding raged for a couple of years, and many students took issue with what they saw as a discrepancy between his salary and what he was worth. However, since I've been back in Columbus for two years now, and know a considerable amount more about the realities of being a university president thanks to my class, I went into the interview without the agenda of talking about those issues.

Dr. McDavis was so great to talk with; he was happy to be talking with an alum, and answered my many questions intelligently and with character. He described the university's proposed Guaranteed Tuition Plan, which would lock in a student's tuition at the same rate for all the years they are in school, even if tuition prices rise in subsequent years; this proposal would make planning for college much easier and take the burden of unforeseen financial hikes off students and their families.

McDavis also spoke about the evolving role of the college president from a more internal role to a more external one--presidents spend much time fundraising, lobbying and traveling, while positions such as the Provost and Chief Financial Officer deal more strictly with on-campus issues.

All in all, we had a great conversation and it was amazing to talk about issues I've been studying in class with a real college president who I've had experience with in the past.

President McDavis (photo from here).

 Only six weeks to graduation! Aaaahhh!!

--Sammie