The Daily Beacon

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30% chance of isolated thunderstorms HIGH LOW 90 73

Hawn, Forsythe among MLB draftees

Friday, June 25, 2010

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Issue 07

E D I T O R I A L L Y

Entertainment Editor Jake Lane analyzes Bonnaroo’s final day PUBLISHED SINCE 1906

I N D E P E N D E N T

S T U D E N T

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http://dailybeacon.utk.edu

Vol. 114

N E W S P A P E R

O F

T H E

U N I V E R S I T Y

O F

T E N N E S S E E

Board approves 9-percent tuition increase Robby O’Daniel Editor-in-Chief As part of its approval of a $1.9 billion budget for fiscal year 2011, the UT Board of Trustees approved a 9-percent tuition increase at the board’s Thursday afternoon meeting. The increase will come to $534 a year for in-state undergraduates and $616 a year for instate graduate students. In-state undergrads will pay $6,452 a year beginning in the fall, and in-state grad students will pay $7,442 annually. The increase was a half-percent higher than the proposed tuition raise of 8.5 percent. Trustee Charles Wharton made the amendment to the original proposal, saying that, though he does not like raising tuition, it’s better to increase the figure now than later. Interim President Jan Simek said 9 percent would be better because it would allow more flexibility. He said the original 8.5 percent proposal was made with the intention of keeping the cost as low as possible for students while still maintaining the same quality of education. Simek and trustee Don Stansberry said the university remains a good buy despite the increase because of the Hope Scholarship providing $4,000 annually, which 99 percent of incoming freshmen receive. Simek emphasized the fact that as incoming students come in with higher GPAs and better test scores, the university needs to continue to place a premium on quality education. “We can’t draw down the quality of what we’re doing as we get better students,” Simek said. “They will cease to come to our institution (if we do that).” Simek said the tuition increase does not make up for the budget reductions. “These increases will comprise essentially additional cuts to our base budget if we don’t do something to try to mitigate them this year,” Simek said. “The increase will also give us a little bit of flexibility as we draw down the stimulus money to deal with the needs that arrive at the end for that funding, as we formulate how we do business. And make no mis-

take, we are reformulating how we do business.” But with the half-percent extra that was approved, $800,000 will come to the university, for use to reduce bottleneck courses and improve academic advising by hiring, easing students’ ability to graduate. Some trustees said that moving from an 8.5to a 9-percent tuition increase might hurt the most those colleges with the new differential tuition in place — the College of Business Administration, College of Nursing and College of Engineering — as the tuition would increase at the same rate as regular undergraduate tuition does. But the amount per year that regular undergraduate tuition is being increased by — $28 — was held up by other trustees as insignificant. Athletic reporting revisions In addition, the board approved the bylaw amendment which revises the reporting line to where intercollegiate athletics now will report directly to the UT-Knoxville chancellor and not the UT system president. Simek appointed a Taskforce on Athletic Reporting in fall 2009 to see who the Department of Intercollegiate Athletics should report to — the system president or the campus chancellor. In the Taskforce on Athletic Reporting’s report and recommendation, it was noted that “no other BCS athletics department currently reports to a state-wide system administration,” and that the last two schools to do so — the University of Colorado and the University of Missouri — have transferred reporting lines in the last decade. The report also said that UTK officials already do much of the athletic administration, such as the admissions, enrollment, financial aid, course registration, academic advising, academic eligibility and judicial affairs cases of student-athletes. See TRUSTEES on Page 2

Tia Patron• The Daily Beacon

On Thursday the UT Board of Trustees approved a 9-percent tuition increase at the board’s Thursday afternoon meeting.

Cheek targets goal of university becoming top 25 public school Robby O’Daniel Editor-in-Chief

Tara Sripunvoraskul • The Daily Beacon

Friday and Saturday, Volunteer Boulevard will be closed from Pat Head Summitt to Loudoun Boulevard while they work on support for the Student Health Center. Drivers will be directed to Johnny Majors Drive to pass the closure.

UT to host alumni artistic summer Chris Barber Staff Writer UT is preparing to host this year’s Alumni Summer College, although it is important to note participants do not necessarily have to be alumni to attend. The program, in its 28th year, is part of the Office of Alumni Affairs’ ongoing “Lifelong Learning” initiative. This year’s theme is “Bravo!” which will concentrate on visual and performing arts and seek to expose participants to a variety of Tennessee experi-

ences. Patrick Wade, organizer of the program in the Office of Alumni Affairs, said the Alumni Summer College is the marquee program of the Lifelong Learning program. Continuing from July 28 to Aug. 1, the Alumni Summer College presents an engaging schedule of theater, museum tours and opera music. “It is a chance to offer educational opportunities to alumni and friends while taking advantage of all the experts we have on campus,” Wade said. The program begins with

dinner and a keynote lecture by UT alumnus Delores Ziegler, professor and chair of the Voice/Opera Division at the University of Maryland School of Music. Ziegler is a noted mezzo-soprano and has performed in many of the world’s greatest opera houses, including the Metropolitan Opera and the Vienna Staatsoper. She graduated from UT with a master’s degree in music in 1979. On Thursday and Friday, other UT professors will deliver lectures in the areas of their research interests. Also Jan

Simek, interim president and distinguished professor of anthropology, will discuss prehistoric rock art in Tennessee. Some of the lecture topics include “The History of Rock and Roll” by Wendel Werner, director of the UT Singers and lecturer in the School of Music, “The Visual Cultures of Shakespeare’s Theater” by Heather Hirschfeld, associate professor of English and “Do You Believe in Centaurs” by Beauvais Lyons, professor of art. See ALUMNI on Page 2

A call to action from Gov. Phil Bredesen has led to a university-wide goal: to become a top 25 public university in the nation. Chancellor Jimmy Cheek said in a report at the UT Board of Trustees meeting on Thursday afternoon that Bredesen challenged UT to become a top 25 university back in January. Immediately after that, a task force was put together, set out to accomplish this. It’s a goal that is not just for the notoriety, Cheek said. “It’s not just to have the designation of being a top 25 university but to have that designation because we’re doing a better job,” Cheek said. He said it would make UT a better institution for students and for the people of the state. In addition, the higher UT made it up the ranks, the more its graduation rate and freshmen retention would improve. In terms of graduation rate and rankings, Cheek said the university needs to get better faster than its current rate. “We need to improve more like Minnesota and less like the University of Tennessee at Knoxville,” he said. The broad-based task force, chaired by Bruce Bursten of the College of Arts and Sciences, included faculty, staff and students. The task force put together a plan between January and June for what to target in attempting to become top 25. Cheek said the “how” would come at a future meeting. The task force looked at a “target group,” made up of the universities ranked No. 21 through No. 29 and compared data between UT, currently ranked No. 52 out of the 600 total public institutions in the country, with those schools. The data comparison showed that while UT is on par with target group schools in ACT scores, the university is behind in other areas. Freshmen retention rate is 84 percent to the target group’s 90 percent. With six-year graduation rate, UT is at 60 percent, while the top 25 target group’s schools are at 75 percent. In other areas, like Ph.D production, UT needs a greater leap — an 80-percent increase — in order to catch up to the target group. “Those gaps must be closed over time if we are to become a top 25 university,” Cheek said. Other places where UT lags behind include average tenureline faculty salary range and faculty awards. Cheek said it would be difficult. The only school that has moved up 18 spots is the University of Pittsburgh, which took the school a decade to accomplish. No one has moved up 27 spots like UT must to become top 25, he said. “But I think we’re up to the challenge,” Cheek said. “It’s an ambitious goal. It’s one that we want to achieve and one that we’re committed to achieve.” See TOP 25 on Page 2


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