Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1954 [PAGE 738]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

1953]

U N I V E R S I T Y OF

ILLINOIS

735

Report to the Board of Trustees on the Administration of the Chicago Professional Colleges

GEORGE D. STODDARD

July i6, 1953 I On November 28, 1952, I made two major recommendations for the administrative reorganization of the Chicago Professional Colleges as follows: That the position of Vice-President of the University in Charge of the Chicago Professional Colleges be abolished as of December I, 1952. (This position was established by action of the Board of Trustees on June 27, 1946, to take effect September 1, 1946, with the concurrence of President Willard and President-elect Stoddard.) That the Dean of the College of Medicine be designated also the Executive Dean of the Chicago Professional Colleges (this was the plan for three years prior to September 1, 1946) and that there be established the position of Associate Dean of the College of Medicine. These recommendations, together with other items in my report of that date, were referred to the Committee on the Chicago Departments. I have now had an opportunity to study the report of the Chicago Departments Committee, which was made available to the Board on June 22, 1953. (I had not seen the report prior to that occasion.) In the paragraphs that follow I shall refer to the Chicago Departments Committee as the Committee. The Committee rightly emphasizes the extent and complexity of the total program -of instruction, research, and public service carried on in the Professional Colleges. The Committee also properly emphasizes the important place of the University's Professional Colleges in the developing Medical Center. The Committee then comes immediately to the conclusion that there is a "need for a full-time administrative head for the Chicago Professional Colleges," pointing out that, in addition to the duties implied above, there is the need to secure in the chief administrative officer "detachment, impartiality, and objectivity." The Committee points out that in 1938 the Office of Vice-President in Charge .of the Professional Colleges was recommended by the University's Bureau of Institutional Research. Accordingly the Committee recommends the continuation of the Office of Vice-President, with clearly defined duties, and an additional administrator, a Medical Director of the Research and Educational Hospitals, who should be "a separate, full-time official." It is to these considerations and to some others not mentioned by the Committee that we should give serious consideration. It is my feeling — a feeling widely shared in medical circles — that the decisions to be made now will have a long-time bearing on the success of the health professions at the University of Illinois. II Certainly there is no question about the significance of this great cluster of resources in the health professions. In both size and quality Illinois ranks in the top bracket of such schools in the United States. Temporarily we shall not increase in size in spite of the student demand for professional training and a general demand for professional services, but it is likely that an upward turn will take place within a few years. This is the stated policy of the Board of Trustees, and it is- backed by recent building developments. T h e pressing problem is how to improve the quality of our academic program and to strengthen morale. The Committee is, of course, right in asking for detachment and impartiality, but such traits can be found in one individual holding more than one office. I believe that detachment is a function of the stature and integrity of a man. When