Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1970 [PAGE 943]

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1970]

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

943

in all medical schools established and maintained by the state of Illinois. Establishment of Departments of Family Practice will provide an organizational structure by which the College of Medicine will seek to implement a comprehensive program of undergraduate, graduate, and continuing education for family (general) practice. T h e University's Budget Request for Operations — Fiscal Year 1971 included an item of $342,000 for the establishment of the Department of Family Practice. Although the Health Education Commission approved the entire amount requested ($342,000), the Board of Higher Education at first approved only $171,000 (within the initial guidelines set by the Governor). Subsequently, the Board approved the remainder ($171,000) for inclusion in a supplemental budget for the health fields. Appropriation bills covering the entire amount have been approved by the Illinois General Assembly and sent to the Governor. T h e University Senates Conference has indicated that no other Senate jurisdiction is involved. The Chancellor at the Medical Center campus and the Executive Vice President and Provost concur. I recommend approval subject to further action by the Board of Higher Education. O n m o t i o n of D r . W a l k e r , t h i s r e c o m m e n d a t i o n w a s a p p r o v e d .

PROPOSAL FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A CENTER FOR ADVANCED COMPUTATION, URBANA

(12) A Center for Advanced Computation as a special unit of the Graduate College is proposed at the Urbana-Champaign campus. The Center will carry on and promote interdisciplinary, problem-oriented research for which the application of unusually powerful computers represents a significant resource. There are several classes of problems of broad national import for which a computer of unprecedented capacity, such as the I L L I A C IV, may provide a unique mechanism for model-building and a hitherto unavailable resource for data handling. With the computer scheduled for completion during this calendar year, the focus of activities on the I L L I A C I V project will shift from computer design and development to the application of the computer to problems as varied as numerical weather prediction, natural resource allocation, large-scale agricultural planning, and multidimensional hydrodynamic calculations. Such problem-solving activities are not in the mainstream of computer science; they call for strong and continuing interaction between and among computer designers and programmers and the experts in the various disciplines and fields of application. Interdisciplinary research of this type, which requires major access to a completely new computational facility and involves the participation of key academic staff in many departments and colleges, can best be accomplished in a Center for Advanced Computation. Proposed Organization and Administration The Center is to be organized along the general lines of other special units in the Graduate College. General policy and guidelines for operation of the Center within the stated mission will be established by a policy committee reporting to the Dean of the Graduate College and appointed by him after consultation with the deans of colleges with special interests in the activities of the Center. The Director of the Center, appointed after consultation with the policy committee, would implement policies and objectives with the assistance of a steering committee made up of active participants in the program. While professional support personnel with appointments in the Center will contribute to any of its projects, research programs in the Center will normally be under the research leadership of academic staff associated with other departments, either on the basis of joint appointments or of less formal collaborative arrangements. Although it would involve and support graduate students in many graduate programs, and will stimulate new interdepartmental programs, the Center would not propose to assume a departmental instructional role or to establish degree programs under its jurisdiction. Objectives The central mission of graduate research on computers will provide and Graduate Research Mission of the Center the Center will be to carry on and promote interdisciplinary a broad array of problems for which unusually powerful unique capability.