Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1942 [PAGE 803]

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BOARD OF TRUSTEES

[March 10

SUMMARY OF IMPORTANT MATTERS P r e s i d e n t C l e a r y p r e s e n t e d a s u m m a r y of i m p o r t a n t m a t t e r s h a n d l e d d u r i n g t h e p e r i o d f r o m M a r c h , 1 9 4 1 , to M a r c h , 1942, a n d a s u m m a r y of m a t t e r s n o w pending. T h i s r e p o r t w a s r e c e i v e d for r e c o r d . Summary of Matters Handled, March, 1941, to March, 1942 1. T h e legislature passed, and Governor Green signed, bills appropriating from tax funds $14,215,591 for the current biennium. Of this total $1,539,938 is for the Research and Educational Hospitals. 2. T h e Research and Educational Hospitals were transferred from the Department of Public Welfare to the University, thereby consummating a project long agreed on by all concerned as highly desirable. 3. Long negotiation by the Chicago Departments Committee finally culminated in the affiliation of the Presbyterian Hospital with the University of Illinois College of Medicine—an advantageous arrangement for both institutions. 4. As a result of the above affiliation, the College of Medicine was enabled to strengthen its faculty by the addition of 238 men and women from the Rush College of Medicine and from the staff of the Presbyterian Hospital. 5. Our College of Medicine on J u n e 24, 1941, arranged to operate on an all-year basis, with four quarters of twelve weeks each. 6. Mrs. Glenn E. Plumb, former trustee, was chosen to represent the University on the Medical District Commission recently created by the legislature. 7. A Union Building for the students, faculty, and alumni of the Chicago Departments was opened as a result of financing worked out through the University of Illinois Foundation, and without use of tax money. 8. The $921,000 bond issue on the Chicago buildings was re-financed at a saving of $167,000 in interest—a real achievement of the Finance Committee of the Board, and of Judge Johnson and Comptroller Morey. 9. T h e University has set up its own civil service system, as authorized by recent legislation. 10. Also, as a result of recent legislation, a Retirement System for employees of the University, the state normal schools, and the three state scientific surveys has become operative. n . T h e Patents Committee of the Board has worked out new and better rules to control cooperative research and the issuance of patents. 12. T h e Building and Grounds Committee of the Board has increased yarious wage scales of labor employed by the University and has made them more equitable. 13. Fees for out-of-state students, and for the summer session, have been substantially increased. 14. Applicants for admission to the University who were in the lowest quarter of their high-school classes, are admitted now only on probation and are carefully supervised to reduce freshman mortality. 15. Better command of English by all graduates of the University is being sought by a broad, well-organized campaign extending through all colleges and into high schools. 16. Binding of books for the University libraries is now being awarded 011 a competitive basis. 17. An oath of allegiance is being required from all employees of the University. 18. A new athletic director and new football coach have been chosen as a result of constructive cooperation between the Athletic Committee of the Board and the Directors of the Athletic Association. 19. Seventeen county scholarships are now available to high-school graduates in Cook County instead of one—a more equitable arrangement as compared with other counties in the state. 20. Experimental work in nuclear physics, a development of recent years, resulted in the completion of two important pieces of equipment for further researches in this field—a large cyclotron designed by Professor P. Gerald Kruger, and a large electron induction accelerator invented and designed by Professor D. W . Kerst.