Financial Report 2007 - Year Ended | 06.30.2007

 

Highlights | Campus Initiatives

Diversity Blueprints: U-M Responds to Challenges of Proposal 2

Newspaper Photo

In November 2006, Michigan voters passed Proposal 2, which amends the Michigan constitution to ban public institutions from discriminating against or giving preferential treatment to groups or individuals based on race, gender, color, ethnicity, or national origin. As a result, U-M changed its admissions and financial aid processes so that these factors no longer are used in decision-making.

The following month, U-M President Mary Sue Coleman asked Provost Teresa A. Sullivan and Senior Vice Provost Lester P. Monts to co-chair a University-wide Diversity Blueprints Task Force. Its mission was to identify innovative strategies to sustain and improve effectiveness in recruiting, retaining, and supporting a diverse student body, faculty, and staff, and to enhance the University’s educational outreach and engagement.

After evaluating hundreds of ideas and hours of input, the 55-member Task Force presented its findings in a public meeting on March 28 at Forum Hall in Palmer Commons. The final report recommends seven strategies built around educational outreach and public engagement; admissions, financial aid, and academic support; and campus climate and the University experience.

“The diversity of our faculty, staff, and students is vital to our future academic strength,” Coleman said. “This report presents us with some immediate actions, and a process for moving forward.”

The Michigan Difference

U-M Launches Economic Initiatives

President Mary Sue Coleman at PodiumThis past year, U-M responded to Michigan’s declining manufacturing sector and soft employment market with multiple initiatives to help bolster the state’s economic recovery.

  • Three projects administered by the U-M Business and Industrial Assistance Division and funded by various state and federal agencies will provide over $5 million to assist Michigan communities facing major plant closures, help manufacturing firms survive in a highly competitive environment, and identify Michigan companies that are creating jobs of the future for which dislocated workers can be trained.
  • Soon after Pfizer Inc. announced in January 2007 that it would close its 177-acre Ann Arbor facility by 2008, the University, the State of Michigan, Ann Arbor SPARK, and Ann Arbor area leaders formed the Pfizer Strategic Working Action Teams (SWAT) to aid the more than 2,100 workers who will be displaced.
  • In November 2006, U-M, Michigan State, and Wayne State universities created the University Research Corridor, an alliance to transform, strengthen, and diversify Michigan’s economy. The three universities, which annually receive about $1.3 billion in external grants, will reach out to businesses, policymakers, and investors to speed up technology transfer, make resources more accessible, and help attract new jobs to the state.

 

community college transfer student iniative Arts on Earth Pandemic disease planning President’s Advisory Committee on Public Art space and facilities utilization initiative

Campus Initiatives in Brief

The University aims to quadruple its enrollment of low- and moderate-income community college transfer students over the next four years with the assistance of a $1 million grant it received from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation in 2006. U-M will invest an additional $3.79 million from its own resources for the initiative.

Arts on Earth, launched in January 2007, is a University-wide initiative that stimulates, explores, and celebrates the dynamic relationship between people and their arts worldwide.

In the summer of 2006, a new U-M Library online catalog called MBooks made available full, searchable text of works digitized through the U-M/Google Digitization Partnership.

In May 2007, U-M took part in a state-wide pandemic disease planning exercise that included all three campuses, executive officers, and activation of the Emergency Operations Center.

With the goal of transforming the environment of the Ann Arbor campus and integrating the visual arts more fully with its educational and research mission, the University established a new President’s Advisory Committee on Public Art.

The U-M Office of Institutional Equity’s new Campus Commitment program will encourage a welcoming climate built on mutual respect for all members of the University community through educational programs for students, faculty, and staff.

Thirty students from Flint’s Whittier Classical Academy participated in the Michigan Student Caucus, a unique program at UM-Flint that engages students of all ages in the political process.

The U-M Business Intelligence Community of Experts (part of a University-wide business intelligence initiative) gave out its first innovation awards to U-M teams who demonstrated creative uses of data to support their decision-making processes.

In September 2006, U-M launched an ambitious, multi-year space and facilities utilization initiative that aims to maximize the use of physical resources on the Ann Arbor campus.

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