Leebron to faculty, staff: V2C becoming tangible reality

Leebron to faculty, staff: V2C becoming tangible reality

BY JENNIFER EVANS
Rice News Staff

In cranes and concrete, news coverage and new applicants, the Vision for the Second Century (V2C) is becoming a visible reality, Rice University President David Leebron told audiences at two town hall meetings this week. Members of the campus community gathered at Baker Hall Tuesday and Wednesday to hear an update of the progress toward V2C goals and to ask questions of Leebron and other top administrators.

”There is a lot of change going on, a lot of it is very visible,” Leebron said, noting not only the construction cranes that dot the campus skyline but also the increasing mentions of Rice in the news.

TOMMY LAVERGNE

President David Leebron discussed the Vision for the Second Century becoming a visual reality during two town hall meetings.

For example, just this week, Leebron noted, the New York Times ran a front-page article about Americans’ religious beliefs, with a quote at the top of the story by Rice sociology professor Michael Lindsay. A similar story ran in the Houston Chronicle, but quoted a different Rice sociology professor, Stephen Klineberg. Last week, Technology Review, MIT’s magazine of innovation, announced its annual list of top 10 technologies that will change the world, and Rice computer science professor Krishna Palem’s energy-efficient microchip was among them. Mechanical engineering professor Pulickel Ajayan has also been garnering worldwide attention for his creation of the darkest material known to man.

Leebron went on to cite news about Jennifer Jones, a graduate student at the Shepherd School of Music, who was one of five winners in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, one of the most prestigious voice competitions in the United States. And in the raging national debate about education, Rice’s Center for Education received extensive coverage of a study suggesting that increased dropout rates are in part a result of the No Child Left Behind policy.

”This is what our venture is about,” Leebron said. ”It’s a venture of learning and discovery, of defining the issues of the day and advancing understanding about them. We’re helping people determine the future of our country and of our world.”

”This is not just a place to get a good education, where good work is done,” he added. ”Our ambition is to be the best.”

To be the best, he said, “we cannot stand still.  Higher education is an intensely competitive enterprise, and we must move forward, but we must also preserve what is special and distinctive about Rice.”

That marriage of progress and preservation is seen in such projects as the construction of Rice’s two new residential colleges, which will accommodate the V2C goal of increasing the number of undergraduate students by 30 percent.

Progress is already being made on that front, Leebron said. This year, Rice had almost 10,000 applicants for the 775 slots available in the fall — the largest application pool in its history. That group reflects an increasing interest from around the country and around the world, he said. Applications from outside Texas are up 40 percent over four years. The number of foreign applications climbed more than 60 percent in the last year alone.

”It’s a great sign that our reputation and our opportunities are getting noticed around the world,” Leebron said.  At the same time, he emphasized that Texas remained extremely important to the success of Rice, and that the university would be stepping up its recruitment efforts in its home state.

Citing another example of Rice’s strides in becoming the best, Leebron pointed to the Collaborative Research Center, the building under construction at the corner of Main Street and University Boulevard. The new facility is designed to bring researchers and physicians from the Texas Medical Center, the world’s largest, together with Rice scientists and engineers to collaborate on biomedical, bioscience and bioengineering research.

”The CRC is a great symbol of what we’re about and what we’re aspiring to be — a building beyond the scale of Rice,” Leebron said. He noted that Rice Owls fans at Reckling Park have a perfect view of the new facility, which puts Rice on the horizon with the other tall buildings of the Texas Medical Center.

He touched on the many other projects on campus that add to the endeavor: renovation of Autry Court, Baker College and the South Servery and construction of a new power plant, a new recreation center and Brochstein Pavilion — a space ”about to become the heart of campus” where faculty, students, staff and visitors can have a cup of coffee or light meal and socialize.

”If we want an intellectual, dynamic community, we need the spaces to support it,” he said.

Progress is happening in less visible ways, he said, such as the university’s emphasis on environmental responsibility and sustainability.

”We cannot afford to be hypocrites,” he said. ”We’re charged with educating students. We can’t tell them to just pay attention to what they see in the classroom.”

To that end, Rice is striving, among other things, to minimize construction waste, use green cleaning techniques that minimize use of chemicals and ensure the buildings are energy efficient.

”Greenness goes deep,” he said.  ”In everything we do on this campus, we must think about the example we set.”

Leebron ended by thanking all Rice employees for their contributions to the university. ”Everything all of you do, whether you’re in Enrollment, Public Affairs, cleaning our buildings or providing food to our students, running our buildings, making sure our classroom technology is working — everything that goes on in this campus is a necessary part of the experience we provide for our students,” he said.