Report from Santa Fe; Dan Lopez

Report from Santa Fe is made possible in part by grants from New Mexico Tech on the frontier of science and engineering education. For bachelor's, masters and PhD degrees, New Mexico Tech is the college you've been looking for. 1-800-428-T-E-C-H. I'm Arnie Mills. This is Report from Santa Fe. And our guest today, Dr. Dan Lopez president of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, situated in Sacoro, New Mexico, Dan. Welcome. I'm happy to be here, Arnie. Dr. Lopez, I served on the Board of Regents, and one thing became crystal clear to me, when Regents search out to find university presidents, they go deep, they want to find an administrator, they check your discipline closely, then the hiring process takes place, and the Regents square you in. The next thing they do, they ask you who took the coke, who stole the coke out of the coke machine, they never ask again about the universities. That's an

exaggeration, of course. But I wanted to ask you, Dan, you've been there for seven years now, and what is the role of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology, what is the role of the president, and the state, and the legislature, and keeping that, you know, that functionary healthy. And let's take it from there. Well, clearly the role of the university is to educate students. Along with that, obviously, research becomes an important component, especially for a university that has graduate students as New Mexico tech does. Beyond that, of course, we are also part of the community. And here's where I feel that universities need to make added strides, take added measures to improve the role in having an impact on society-wide. Economic development is one way of doing that. I hope that we're moving in that direction much, much more sure-footed these days than we were in the past. So now when we

go to the president, obviously he's the chief executive officer. His main role in my mind is to provide leadership. It's not to determine how many pencils to buy or how much how many computers we should have. That information is garnered from from the line people, the people that are really doing the work. Our as presidents, I believe, have to have a vision, not hallucination. I mean they're saying we ought to draw that distinction, but we ought to have a vision of what that university ought to look like today in 50 years from now. Following that vision, we ought to execute measures to achieve that vision. At New Mexico Tech, we have developed an updated strategic plan that helps us move towards that vision. Our vision of New Mexico Tech is to have an institute that teaches young people how to solve and be creative in dealing with complex science and engineering problems. Very focused, very, very, very direct kind of vision and

measure for the university. And I think we've been very successful in moving now into the seventh year of that strategic plan to achieve many of those goals. When people today seem a little afraid to talk about strategic plans, you look at like a seven-year plan. And I know you had a feeling we're commissioned to do this. I talked to you earlier on about the mission statement of New Mexico Tech. I would like to look, let's, you mentioned the economy. And quite some time back, I talked to the General Mel Montanya, who then was head of the National Guard out here. And he said, we often need help from the legislature. And how do we get it? And I said, go into the communities, let them know that the federal government brings in anywhere from 70 to 98, almost $100 million to the various communities around the state that have National Guard Facility. Does that happen with the universities? Clearly, and this is one of the

messages that we would like the public to understand that the universities not only educate and do research, but they also do a public service. And the public service can be measured to some degree by the amount of funding that these universities bring in, the number of jobs that we create, not only jobs within the university, but the spin-off jobs within the community. At New Mexico Tech, we account for about 17% of the employment workforce in Socorro County, but yet we account about 48% to the payroll. That means we're bringing in an awful lot of high-paying jobs into the community. And point of fact, we bring in about 25, 26 million dollars a year above and beyond of whatever's appropriated from the legislature. Another one that's stopping there from on. The legislature finishes the session the most recent when we had, and they'll say, this is how much we're going to give the university for salaries. They tried to mandate that as they can. And this much money will go toward construction

work and the rest for the specific programs. You're talking about above and beyond that. Above and beyond that, and the money that we are being able to attract these days comes not only from the federal government, but a significant portion comes from the private sector, private companies that need a certain level of research done that they have, do not have the world with all to do. And that's especially true today in the oil industry because in the United States, we have mostly independence operating much of the oil industry in this country. They do not have those large research staffs. So we provide the research on a contract basis to many of these companies do the same thing in the explosives area. And we hope to, in the future, begin to do a lot of that in the areas of hydrology. So there's a number of areas where universities can have a direct role with the private sector. And we're pushing that very hard at New Mexico tech. I must say though that that the University of New Mexico and New

Mexico state do the same. And as a matter of fact, the University of New Mexico brings in way and excess of a hundred million dollars. That's why they're classified as a Carnegie one institute. So so does New Mexico state. So we have two Carnegie one institutions in the state of New Mexico. I think that speaks well of higher education in the state. You mentioned working with various facets of the community. I'd look at Los Alamos labs. What kind of contract work would you do with the labs for example? We have a good work in relationship with San DL laboratories and they do a lot of work with us and we're very pleased with that relationship. Unfortunately we've not been able to develop the same level of relationship with Los Alamos. We do some work and the area that they decided most credit on is they have hired a lot of our students, especially at the intern level to begin with. That provides obviously summer employment for our students. And then they've gone on and hired many of our graduates. So I just

want to improve upon that relationship is my major point to the same extent that we've been able to do with San DL laboratories. When they put together their president's counsel out here that's somewhat new in a sense. That's correct. And you were heading that up and I chuckled about it because of your background in administration and in government. You know I had said once the same thing Dan Lopez is not a headline hunter and I talked to one of your staff members and I said you may find you're getting raises and you won't even know where it comes from but I know where it comes from. But you know the system up here and I have looked at the various presidents we have out here. A man like Dr. Frost for example out at Eastern. I doubt if New Mexico first and you've been very involved in it. I doubt if that would have gotten off the ground as a New Mexico think tank. If Dr. Frost had not been active in that. But if we look at all that each president of our four-year schools has a different

personality they bring something else to the table. Do you find it very much so and I really enjoy working with my colleagues and especially through the Council of University presidents have been fortunate by their gracious acquiescence to lead that group for about seven years now since I became president of the university I became president of the council and it has been a very effective tool for trying to narrow the options trying to define the goals and then most importantly communicate them uniformly to the legislature. So I find that this council is a very unique tool for permitting universities to get their story in front of the legislature and not have too many disparate views that would create problems in trying to achieve our funding. And I feel very comfortable and the legislature has been very gracious. They've acknowledged and recognized that we are working as a group as a team. We produce reports. We have an accountability report. We have report on economic impact and

we have a report that we're doing on teacher preparation. Three areas that are very important to the legislature and we're trying to respond directly to those legislative concerns so this year we're upgrading those three reports and providing them with action plans to show the legislature that we're serious about moving towards the goals that they have set for us. You're looking at the goals they set for you. That's correct. Here again we look at situations where when we name people for specific jobs and specific commissions the tendency is for everyone who is not educated in the area to say let's not just tell you what we would like. We're going to show you how to do it and that really is your role. That's the one area that I try to be very clear with boards of regions in even in my own case and of course in a very respectful way that we understand each other's role. The boards major role is to hire the president or fireman, as the case may be, if they're not satisfied with his performance or

her performance or in addition set the broad policy role for that university. After that the role ought not to be micromanaging within the university structure. I've been fortunate. My board has given me a lot of latitude to carry out my responsibilities so I find it and I think it's pretty much the same for the other universities that they've had pretty good boards. I found it interesting. People often forget that once a region is named he's pretty much authoritative as far as the relationship with the governor goes. The governor doesn't go in and tell a region this is what I want you to do. They may suggest and say we want you know better school or help clean up a mess down something of that nature but basically that region is on his own. It's a constitutional officer and you know I don't know that citizens in general recognize that the regents are just like any other appointed official with one exception is they can't be fired unless they commit a

high crime or misdemeanor. Be someone on the steps and university that's correct but they have extraordinary powers and their constitutional powers they're constitutionally derived so that their word is long and to the extent that regions act out the roles and concert with that intent I think they land up providing a great service for the state. I often wonder why we don't have a an emeritus president's council you know we've had I think an ideal term for a president to serve is 11 years and then they often look say no let me out but if you look at that kind of a term you have people and I would single electoral Thomas down it who had been so active in the Mexico state and on his own in world food problems and you look in world food problems also in the Mexico's food problem but to drop on those people because the question I would have is how far you look you had a seven-year plan in mind how far can we

have these kind of commissions how long can we look at a plan are we afraid to look at 50 years well we shouldn't be you know we know for a fact that the Japanese for example as a society tend to plan in very very long terms up to 100 years so looking forward and trying to envision what you might need and expect within 50 years it's not unreasonable our plan of course was more modest than that we tried to look out in a very in a very rough way in a very approximate manner say 25 years our action plans though were based on a much much shorter time frame the one thing that is necessary was all strategic plans there's supposed to be living documents and updated periodically and that's what we've done and we we started the plan almost seven years ago we updated it last year and we'll probably looking at another

update within a few years so that and as a matter of fact it was a very interesting exercise because at the end of it we saw that we had to modify a couple of things that that we had envisioned some years before it's interesting that we look at government that way but again so much of your background in public administration and you know that we watch government it is a living breathing thing and that that stage is never quite the same every year we come back for another performance in the recent legislature for the first time that I had the feeling I stayed represented Max call said it is time for us to tap in to the funds on these severance tax monies for schools and it was interesting because every time you do that if you do it successfully you also free up other money and I noticed for example in the lottery scholarships schools like yours gave scholarships to people will you say we're going to have 100% scholarships from the Mexico high school students going to the

Mexico schools you're freeing up other scholarship money sure the schools were excellent in forming the bridge between high school and the first year of college so that it was smooth and so we have that money now I look at something like as representative closer we got to get money for school construction and we have schools public schools that have gone 40 years without having the kind of upgrading that they need I would imagine that same problem exists with schools like in the mexico tech and others well you know the legislature in our case has been very very generous and I can tell you that we have some needs but not to the extent of some of the other schools for example the university in the mexico has infrastructure needs that are way beyond the capacity of the state to handle under the current arrangements I suspect that the other universities have similar problems we have a small problem in that area but we've been so fortunate that the legislature on a

yearly basis has addressed a good bit of our problems that we're not quite in the same condition going to the permanent fund that's an interesting proposal and I think it ought to be looked at seriously I think we ought to debate it openly and I think there may be other ways of doing it without having to tap the permanent fund I can think of ways as you know I was a DFA secretary so I thought to myself that perhaps creating a statewide bonding capacity at the school district level might be a way to get around having to to tap the fund we're looking at public school that's correct that's not university that's not universities and I think universities don't have the need of 1.5 billion dollars which is what is claimed before public schools I I think what our needs would be would be something less than that and and we

probably could find ways of funding that if if the public schools were competing with universities for the public funds that are available for capital projects see so as you found a solution for capital projects with with the public schools you would release money then that could be made available to to four-year institutions and two-year institutions for that matter I see the I see the same situation existing like with the lottery money up until the last session it was 60% for capital construction 40% for the lottery scholarship if you went ahead with whatever plan to raise the raise the monies that would free up that money the construction money for example for universities and others but you're happy with the construction for in the mexico 10 we you know in the last seven years we've been successful at at getting enough money to do the major projects every single year since we've

been here we've been able to find the support amongst the legislature to do these projects so we've had a constant construction program for seven years and it's upgraded that facility to a degree that's really really amazing if you have a chance you ought to come down to the mexico tech and we can show you around I said I'll be as we speak I'll be on the campus down there our local radio station is as they're very involved in the local community and Mike Miller down there say can you come down and moderate a panel and so I was there before and we'll be back again okay and I'll be out to the campus I appreciate that and if there's there's another area here I know when students will start looking about where they want to go to a college you know campus outlook looks great and the background of the students you know someone said to me and if I'm correct because I think he was still there when I first came to the mexico

Dr. Workman oh you son and I forget who it was who told me they said but thank Dr. Dr. Workman because he said I want to get out of the high the big push for athletes you know the athletics in the college and he said that meant we could really concentrate upon the the scholastic role you feel that way too yes because it makes my job easier I can tell you that athletics do have a role to play in higher education especially when you have a home campus and and they do create a certain speedy core that is helpful and healthy for the university but all things being equal I'm happy not having to deal with an athletic program and I think we provide enough alternative athletic activities club sports intramurals this sort of recreational athletics that our students are pretty happy but I must say in all fairness that that athletics does when properly handle does provide a certain rally important and especially

for alumni you know an alumni are very important to to a university they're they're the basis of not only direct funding support but they're also the basis of much political support you know I remember back at Columbia and after Lou little left I don't think they had a winning team for 40 years and it was almost depressing and pretty tough for the alumni and that during that period you mentioned did you have ideas that you would like you know that you'd like to see legislate you take steps and I'm in the governor too and the funding for it to provide for the public schools same situation for the colleges and universities or do you have a separate idea I you know I believe and I've not done a definitive study but I believe that there would be enough excess capital funding if we're able to take care of the public schools when you look at the critical capital outlay program that's available and important to the public schools but the reason that's there is because we

haven't paid attention to infrastructure for a long time within the public schools in a comprehensive way that would release that money it probably would release some of the the lottery money for capital and then the general obligation bonds as well as seven stacks would be available those are four sources that if they did not have to be primarily dedicated to public schools then what leaves sufficient funding to address the needs of higher education that's that's what I believe in I think after some examination I think it could be worked out you and I go back to the period when we did not have two year schools I remember if you came out here to do graduate work and you lived in Gallup or place you know 200 miles away from Albuquerque 120 miles away you had to go to Albuquerque or New Mexico State at that time or down to tech to get the degree and pretty tough commutes and then when they brought in the two-year schools that made it easier for youngsters wanting the first couple of years out of the way and for graduate students and we also had programs that were

stretching out where you could say I can take a couple of courses to and that's really what you look for in graduate work the two-year school school program was fought when it was initiated at that time we were looking and never thought they would have 17 two-year schools you know and more more now and that capacity you happy with the way the two the row of the two-year schools oh I think they do a wonderful job and the one thing though that we ought to recognize that two-year schools have a very very special mission to perform not all of that includes transition in students to to four-year schools a good number a good percentage of students that go to two-year schools want a very specific vocation or a a a technical background in some specific area and they want to go to work and and their goals are very different in general than they are from students and matriculated a four-year institution not all of them we still have a fairly good articulation from the two-year schools and they do feed in to to the four-year programs but I don't believe that's the primary role of two-year

schools I think the primary role of two-year schools is to prepare students for work TVI has a commercial that says you get a degree you can use and and I think they're getting to the idea that they provide people with an immediate immediate skill that they can put to use in in the economy the degree means a student is going to have more money and he's going to the state will realize it when they get the personal income taxes that we know the CHE Commission on higher education I think one of the reasons it was put together was to stop in runs from universities who had you know ten-year among the lawmakers please with the function and the and the efforts of the CHE the CHE has a very difficult function because they they have to respond to at least three masters the governor the legislature into their own board so as as a policy group they they have a very very difficult job of staying focused because they're pulled in many many different directions and then when you add the

universities with their own aspirations and their own goals that creates for a very very complex and difficult relationship at a personal level we've worked very well with the Commission a lot of respect for the director of his Hamlet the problem primarily is structural in my mind and for that reason it doesn't work as smoothly as one would like it to very always you're always open to changes we're always open to change I can remember we did a show once in the discussion you know the national governor's association got very much involved in what we can do with high-tech you know and I I felt that the time the problem was I never knew of an Intel Pentium reaching out and grabbing someone hugging a student when they needed help I detected that you had reservations about the dependency too much dependency upon computerization as such in the in the higher education field to overlap into the teaching function still saying but well still think you know and I want to clarify

that point my concern isn't that we use computers we obviously have to do that you cannot send a young person to the today's economy without computer skills my concern is that in addition to the computer skills people need to be socialized to live and and be successful citizens that portion sometimes if you're not able to congregate students within a university structure for example it's hard to impart the values of society the values of democracy even just in a general way and so my concern then is not that we restrict computer usage my concern is that we make sure that we include the other things that people need in order to be well-rounded citizens I asked you for a final work today on what you would ask people to look at it before we come back again and say let's look at the next problems or would it be that we need to prepare people to work and be competitive in the world market our students are not no longer going to be competing just within their own communities so they need

this broad skills language skills computer skills knowledge base skills about the world history political science and in my last word simply is we need to be citizens prepared to compare to compete in a world economy you know in the 40 years the one area where institution or knowledge helps I don't think I have ever seen the six schools out here have the leadership that we presently have not had line hunters but competent people and Dan Lopez you have been known up here for your integrity wisdom the credibility and honesty and not much more you could ask for for a university president I'm Rene Moses and we like to thank our guest today Dr. Dan Lopez president of the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology it's a quarrel thank you for being with us on report from Santa Fe report from Santa Fe is made possible in part by grants from New Mexico tech on the frontier of science and engineering

education for bachelor's masters and PhD degrees New Mexico tech is the college you've been looking for 1-800-428 T-E-C-H you