From the VP- Rebuilding Trust in the Age of Misinformation

Recently, I attended a Higher Education Leadership Roundtable hosted by the UW Alumni Association. The roundtable discussion focused on the importance of strengthening public trust in universities which has been on a significant and concerning decline in recent years. A 2019 Gallup poll found that just 51% of U.S. adults believe a college education is “very important” — down from 70% in 2013. This echoed similar findings by Pew Research Center from the same year. Gallup suggests that this break down in trust results from concerns around affordability and declining confidence in higher education as a neutral disseminator of information.

Technology may further compound the decrease in trust. The digital age connects communities and individuals in ways that belonged squarely in science fiction fifty years ago. We can share information faster than ever before and experience news stories as they unfold. However, this increased access also brought challenges that threaten our ability to be well informed and to have productive discourse. Now anyone with an internet connection can share any piece of information — or misinformation — instantly to thousands of others who can then share it with thousands more. To make matters worse, misinformation is increasingly difficult to spot. From computer generated images that fake diversity in advertising to deepfake videos realistically putting words in people’s mouths they never said, it is easy to see why we have developed information trust issues.

It is clear that colleges and universities need take steps to rebuild public trust both in universities and in information systems as a whole. To address perennial concerns around cost, the UW developed the Husky Promise program a decade ago which guarantees full tuition coverage for eligible low income Washington state students. Additionally, the state-wide higher education community came together last year to support the Workforce Education Investment Act which will extend financial aid to 110,000 Washington state students. Because of these programs in the state of Washington, college is increasingly affordable.

The Center for an Informed Public, a new collaboration between the UW and WSU, seeks to shed light on misinformation/disinformation and rebuild confidence in information sources like public universities. CIP, which launched in November, is a nonpartisan, multi-disciplinary center whose mission is to resist strategic misinformation, promote an informed society and strengthen democratic discourse. The center is dedicated to researching misinformation and sharing findings with lawmakers, companies and community members. Universities are uniquely equipped to help solve far-reaching societal challenges like misinformation. And by inviting community stakeholders to the table through collaborative efforts like CIP, the UW can strengthen its value proposition and help renew trust in information systems more broadly.

For more about the Workforce Education Investment Act, I’d recommend this editorial in The Seattle Times as a starting point. To learn more about CIP’s great work, I encourage you to attend the Center for an Informed Public’s upcoming town hall event. Tickets can be purchased here.

From the VP- 2020 Legislative Session Preview

Following a historic financial investment in higher education by the Washington state Legislature last year, I am excited for the 2020 legislative session which kicks off today in Olympia. Last year, our state drew national attention with the passage of the Workforce Education Investment Act which among other things fully funded the Washington College Grant. A big win for students, parents and employers, this landmark legislation established one of the most progressive higher education investments in the country by guaranteeing financial aid to more than 110,000 qualified students.

Lawmakers also invested directly in the University, providing funding for critical operating and capital budget requests. Investments included critical support for UW Medicine and funding for new a mental and behavioral health teaching hospital – a move that acknowledges the need to address our growing mental health crisis. To the many the UW faculty, students, alumni and other supporters who advocated with us in 2019, thank you!

This week our State Relations team is headed back to Olympia for the 60-day session. Mindful of last year’s investments, the University will put forward a modest legislative agenda limited to requests which are mostly holdovers from last year. The agenda includes five requests:

$3.8 million in Maintenance and Operations (M&O) funding for the Hans Rosling Center for Population Health. Construction of this facility was funded by state dollars and a transformational gift from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, however there remains a gap in funding. With the building scheduled to open this fall, the UW is asking the Legislature to fully fund the maintenance of this new public asset.
$1 million in pre-design funding for phase two of the Magnuson Health Science Center replacement and renovation. The need for more well-trained healthcare provider is clear. In an attempt to meet this need, the Magnuson Health Sciences Center is currently operating well beyond capacity and is in need of major upgrades. In 2019, the Legislature funded the construction of a new health sciences education building. This additional funding will enable the UW to plan for the replacement and redesign of the remaining health sciences complex.
$725K to fund three new Assistant Attorney General positions within the UW to handle workload increases due to the UW’s growth in size and complexity. This request is in conjunction with the state Attorney General’s Office.
Reappropriation of conditional wage increases at the UW. Last session, $7.4 million was earmarked to support an additional 1% salary increase for all represented employees — an allocation contingent on the UW providing the remaining funds. Because the increase was not financially feasible for the University, this funding was returned to the state. The UW and three eligible collective bargaining units are requesting the funds be reallocated in FY21 to provide one-time payments to lower-wage workers.
Reauthorization of the Joint Center for Aerospace Technology Innovation which will sunset June 30, 2020 without reauthorization. JCATI fosters economic development, creates jobs and allows for collaborative research between business and academic partners.

On a personal note, the beginning of the 2020 session also marks my 16^thyear working in government relations for the University – the same amount of time that I previously spent working on staff for the Washington State Senate. A lot has transpired during this time both within the UW and in the state capitol, but the bottom line is that the current leadership of the University has developed a powerfully positive relationship with state elected officials, our partners in higher education, and the labor and business communities. This foundation will help insure continued investment as well as sustain the University through the next inevitable economic downturn. I’m proud to have played a part in shaping this foundation and look forward to at least a few more years of work to build on this success.

From the VP- We are the University FOR Washington (and Alaska too!)

Now that I have recovered slightly from our football team’s heartbreaking loss to the Ducks last weekend, I have had a chance to reflect on my recent trip to Anchorage. You might be surprised that the UW is sending staff to the 49^th state, but our relationship with Alaska dates back more than a century. In 1909, Seattle hosted its first world’s fair, the Alaska-Yukon-Pacific (AYP) Exposition, on the UW campus. The fair commemorated the 1897 Yukon Gold Rush and celebrated Seattle’s growing ties to Alaska, the Canadian Northwest and the Pacific Rim. The famous Olmstead Brothers designed the layout for the AYP Exposition which ultimately became the blueprint for the main UW campus. Continue reading “From the VP- We are the University FOR Washington (and Alaska too!)”

From the VP- What do Governor Jay Inslee, Seattle Metro Chamber CEO Marilyn Strickland and Microsoft’s Brad Smith have in Common? A Liberal Arts Degree!

Steve Jobs once said, “Technology alone is not enough. It’s technology married with the liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the results that make our hearts sing.” The Apple Macintosh and iPhone sold millions not just because they had impressive processing power. They also looked and felt cool thanks to their sleek design and clever marketing. When revolutionizing an industry, it turns out employers need engineers as well as poets and artists.

Now let me be clear. The UW is very bullish about increasing opportunities in STEM because we clearly don’t have enough room to accommodate all the students who want to earn degrees in these fields. Our state legislature has recently been very supportive of providing additional funding to expand enrollments in computer science and engineering because of how important it is to our state economy.

Since the end of the Great Recession, however, there has been a lot of anxiety about the benefit of any college degree, but particularly those degrees that don’t immediately lead to a high-paying job. With tech giants like Microsoft, Amazon and Google in our backyard, students, parents and employers are urging the UW to expand opportunities to earn degrees that will lead to high wage employment in STEM fields.

But what about those students who have a passion for history, literature, music, economics or communications? Are they doomed to a lifetime of low wage employment because they are simply not interested in pursuing degrees in engineering, computer science or business? A recent NY Times article titled “In the Salary Race, Engineers Sprint but English Majors Endure” should give liberal arts students (and their skeptical parents) some hope for the future. The article challenges the conventional wisdom that STEM majors are more financially successful in their careers than liberal arts majors. In looking at first jobs after university, the financial differences are significant. STEM grads earn more than their liberal arts counterparts. However, their initial advantage fades steadily. By age 40, humanities majors appear to catch up!

With the economy changing so rapidly over the past few decades, we often tell our students that they won’t have 3-4 jobs in their lifetime – they will have 3-4 careers and one or two of those careers haven’t been invented yet! As Tom Friedman wrote in his landmark book “The World is Flat” “in an age when parts or all of many jobs are constantly going to be exposed to digitization, automation, and outsourcing…it is not only what you know, but how you learn that will set you apart. Because what you know today will be out-of-date sooner than you think.”

A liberal arts education is intended to expand the capacity of one’s mind to think critically and analyze information effectively. It develops and strengthens the brain to think within and across all disciplines; a skill that serves over a lifetime. In the future, liberal arts degree might prove to be a strong background for workers trying to adapt to an ever-changing economy.

From the VP – The Future of Undergraduate Education

It is pretty rare during the hectic days of a legislative session to can take a short break from committee hearings and member meetings to immerse yourself in some of the latest thinking about the challenges facing higher education in the United States in 2019. But last Wednesday in Olympia, about 50 representatives from public and private higher education institutions and associations had the chance to do just that when representatives from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences paid a visit to the state capital to discuss their most recent report “The Future of Undergraduate Education, The Future of America.”

Completed last year, the report focuses on three challenges currently facing undergraduate education – completion, quality and affordability. Each of these issues is also top of mind for the UW as well as our fellow baccalaureate and community and technical college partners. Michael McPherson from the Spencer Foundation, who co-chaired the Commission which completed the report, and Sandy Baum from the Urban Institute, a Commission member, walked us through the reports major findings a recommendations for policymakers.

Perhaps one of the most important conclusions is that “access” to higher education is not as much of an issue as it was a generation or two ago. More than 90% of U.S. students managed to find their way into a two or four year institution within a few years of high school graduation. The major challenge facing higher education today is completion – insuring that students finish their two or four year degree and are able to secure a family wage job upon graduation. Some barriers to completion are surely financial and so affordability remains an important goal for state policymakers who are working this session to make the State Need Grant an entitlement program so that is will be protected from future economic downturns.

But there are other barriers to degree completion that require greater investments in two and four year institutional budgets to ensure quality faculty and staff, sufficient courses, adequate academic, transfer and mental health counseling – all key ingredients to ensuring students can persist to a two or four year credential. It’s a solid report and the lunchtime event sponsored by the College Promise Coalition was a unique chance to pause in the middle of a busy legislative session to refocus on the important reasons why we are all pushing to have elected officials make 2019 the year of higher education.