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The W. Roger Webb Forensic Science Institute at entrance to campus
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Harold Holden sculpture of Broncho
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"building a student-conscious campus"
(An unsanctioned look back at UCO--personal opinion)
Everyone
has pet peeves and pet projects, I believe. That is certainly true of
the journalists I've known. Certainly of my professor colleagues. And
over the years I've realized it is true as well of university
administrators, no matter the level.
There's no judgment in that, because pet peeves and pet projects are neither bad nor good on their face.
What I
came to value in my years at the University of Central Oklahoma were
colleagues and superiors who could be detached enough to view their
personal opinions and interests in a fair manner...working to make sure
that they could work for the overall benefit of students and the
university as a whole.
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| Entrance to campus |
And
I dreaded those who were so self-centered that they could not be fair,
would put personal projects and beliefs before the common good. That
destructive behavior can harm or destroy every level of the university,
from staff operations, to classrooms, departments, colleges and the
university as a whole. Such unethical existence is the very opposite of
the standards of professionalism educated, or any others for that
matter, people should exhibit.
Even
more dreaded were those micro-managers who would take disagreement or
differences personally, and hold grudges and seek vengeance against
those who didn't kowtow to all their wishes.
I've
known both kinds, and realize every profession have those opposites.
We've been fortunate over the years at UCO to have more of the positive
people than the negative.
Looking
back at the changes at UCO, in this top-down administrative world of
Oklahoma, that is certainly true of the four people who have been
president.
I began
this journal series, documenting the visual, physical plant changes at
UCO which were not here when I started. It's been a continuing process
of building, for the most part, a more student-conscious campus.
George
Nigh's pet projects in his five years here served the university as a
whole, taking it from a stuck-in-the-status quo world as a commuter
college. I may poke fun at all the fake Greek columns and hodge-podge
architecture around campus that is part of his heritage, but for the
vast majority of his projects immensely benefited the university.
When
Roger Webb took over as president in 2007, serving until 2011, the
university was starting to explode in enrollment, but it lacked needed
improvements you couldn't see--infrastructure.
When
I arrived, we had one computer in the department. There were no
computer labs on campus. Through the early years I cobbled together,
missing funds, an early Mac lab. President Webb came to a campus
with few if any computer labs on campus, and there was almost no
coordination for fees to pay for coordinating and updating them. His
hiring and focus on that need changed the way the university operated,
and looks.
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| Nigh's addition that joined two department buildings |
In
addition, I'm forever grateful that he pushed, and then Provost Don
Betz authorized, the merger of the Journalism Department and Oral
Communication department that housed broadcast. Nigh's addition joined
the building, but not the people inside. I'd been working on that needed
change for almost five years, and it took a couple more before it
happened.
We
were fighting against academic turf and tradition, plus years of ill
will between the two and unequal distribution of resources to students,
but it made no sense to have two separate departments, given the changes
in communication. That was my pet peeve and project. We still have a
neglected building--student study areas, computer labs, faculty
bathrooms, etc.--but at least we're merged, and still working on it.
Thus was born today's Mass Communication Department. It wouldn't have happened if it had not been for Roger Webb and Don Betz.
Webb
had his pet projects as well--from his background in law enforcement,
and academic turf claims were overrode by presidential fiat (another
word I've always wanted to use)--thus the School of Criminal Justice
came to be, splitting from Sociology, and the building of the Forensic
Science Building, now named after Webb.
When I
first came, I was told we'd soon build a classroom building because we
needed more space. We still need more space. Twenty years later, the
Transformative Learning Center was built, though not every department
has access to its classrooms. "Transformative learning" is one of the
principles now enshrined in UCO's mantra, knowing there's more to
learning than lectures. Those of us somewhat old sarcastic types claim
we've been doing this for years, and jibe at it as the "learning
learning" center, since all learning is "transformative." But it's great
to have a new building, with great technology and more space. It is
really cool.
Other
improvements included a wellness center, new student
housing, and additions to the football stadium, a continuing pet project
of administrators, but not of most faculty, nor most students who never attend
games. There are many other atheltic facility improvements for other sports.
But sculptures and landscaping improved on campus with increasingly uniform signage.
So here are more photos of the physical changes taking place during Roger Webb's tenure.
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| The really cool Transformative Learning Center... |
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| Wellness center |
The Commons--new student housing north of the library, south of Wellness Center
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| New student housing |
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| Ditto |
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| Wantland Stadium has been spiffed up, with help of fees assessed every UCO student |
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| And private support, including a great community bank |
The athletic program makes a concerted effort to attract crowds, but we're not OU or OSU.
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| Plunkett Park is a field where the Industrial Arts Building was when I started. |
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| Breathe was one of first new sculptures on campus |
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| Outside Wellness Center, UCO is an Olympic training center |
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| Don't know when this Broncho was erected |
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| This corner was dedicated before I came, but landscaping has been improved. |
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| Took years to get the student darkroom out of the unsafe basement, but we named it after our colleague, the photo program founder, Woody Gaddis, one of just five journalism faculty when I arrived. |
