Thurs Sept 30, 2021

4:35 p.m.

Thank you, Aaron, for that kind introduction, and for returning to UW-Madison to lead our Recreation & Wellbeing programs at one of the most exciting and challenging moments in the last half century.

I also want to thank President WhiteEagle and the Ho Chunk Nation for working with us over the last couple of years to identify new and better ways to recognize the 12,000-year history of the Ho-Chunk people on this land … and to move us toward a greater awareness of those who lived here before us.

As some of you know, we have built a number of new buildings and restored a number of historic buildings on this campus in the last several years.  Some are facilities for research and education … some are spaces for relaxing and socializing … and some are places (like our new Music Center) that invite the community in.

But very few do all of these things.

And only one will do all of these things while also providing state-of-the-art facilities for students, faculty, staff, and members of the public to take care of their health, learn new skills, and develop lifelong habits that support physical and mental wellbeing.

Not to mention have a lot of fun.

This new building will reflect the values of the family whose leadership gift has brought us together today:

• A passion for innovation
• A dedication to promoting health and wellbeing
• A commitment to the broader community that goes back generations
• And a deep understanding of the life-changing power of education.

Over the years, they have been generous donors to Badger Athletics and to academic programs and student scholarships at the Wisconsin School of Business, the College of Engineering, the School of Human Ecology, and the School of Medicine and Public Health.

And today, I am delighted to announce that Jim and Sue Bakke have given a $20m gift to create the Bakke Recreation and Wellbeing Center.

As most of you know, Jim is president of Sub-Zero-Wolf, one of Madison’s great businesses and one that was started by Jim’s grandfather.  So it won’t surprise you that this building will also be home to the Wolf Teaching Kitchen and the new Sub-Zero Ice Arena.

This is the kind of gift that’s going to generate a lot of excitement and inspire other donors to get involved.

Jim and Sue – thank you for this extraordinary gift!

The Bakke Center is going to re-define what a center for recreation and wellbeing can be.  Because in addition to offering first-rate exercise and wellness programs:

• It will be an academic space for our top-ranked Kinesiology program – one of the fastest-growing majors on this campus – and our Adapted Fitness program.

• It will be a space that welcomes the community in with community memberships and events … camps and clinics … cooking classes … and 1:1 nutritional counseling.

• And there is no question that the Sub-Zero Ice Arena is going to be one of the hottest spots on campus! We are in Wisconsin and ice skating is a top recreational sport.

Jim and Sue:  Thank you again for your generosity and your vision for a building that will be many things to many people.  It feels great to be able to say:

For the first time in more than 50 years, we will have a recreation and wellbeing facility on this side of campus that is worthy of our standing as a top university!

Now please join me in a warm Wisconsin thank-you and welcome for Jim and Sue Bakke!

Kohl Center

Fri Sept 3, 2021

1:45-3:15 p.m.

Hello, new Badgers!  I am Chancellor Rebecca Blank.  I know you’ve already been welcomed a few times, and now it’s my turn.

On behalf of the faculty, staff and administration here at UW, I am delighted to welcome you to the 2021-2022 academic year at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

You are now students at one of the top public universities in the world.  Congratulations!

It’s wonderful to see all of you here, and I know we have many members of the faculty and staff here as well who are eager to meet you.

This is a pretty special class – there are about 8,400 of you, which makes this the largest freshman class in UW-Madison history.  Graduation Day 2025 is going to pack Camp Randall Stadium!

We also have more than 1,000 transfer students joining us this fall, who will be graduating even sooner.

Those of you who are freshmen were selected from a record-breaking pool of applicants … more than 54,000 students applied for those 8,400 spots.

We picked you because you are highly qualified academically, but also because we believe that your talents and interests make you an excellent fit for this great university.

I’ve seen you all taking lots of photos – now it’s my turn.

[pull out phone and take photo of the students]

Your first official UW portrait …  I’ll Tweet it from my account – if you want to see it, follow me @BeckyBlank.

I want to tell you a bit about the people sitting around you:

• Lots of you are from right here in WI. This class includes one of the highest numbers of WI residents in the last 20 years.

• You also come from 48 other U.S. states (missing ND) along with Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico (let’s hear from you if you’re from one of the top 5 states – Illinois? Minnesota? California? New York? New Jersey?) Welcome!

• Our international freshmen are from 47 nations outside of the U.S.

• And nearly 2 out of every 10 freshmen and 3 out of every 10 transfer students this fall are the first generation in their family to go to college. A special congratulations to all of them!

[applause]

To study at one of the world’s premier research institutions is an experience like no other.  In the next four years, you will learn from renowned scholars … participate in groundbreaking research … and make friends from all over the world.

This is an exciting place.  But it can also feel a little overwhelming, particularly when you’re new.  You heard Dr. Reesor talk about the importance of finding your community here, and Kyla told you how she did that.

Getting involved is not only good for your social life … it’s an important part of your education.  If you leave UW with only classroom learning, we haven’t done our job.  The Wisconsin Experience stretches well beyond the classroom!  So think about study abroad, volunteering in the community through the Morgridge Center for Public Service, or joining a few student organizations.

COVID-19

We’re really excited to have you here in person, and I know you’re excited to be here.  So here’s what needs to happen for all of us to stay here in person:

• Wear a face covering whenever you’re inside a campus buildings.
• Don’t come to class or work or do any campus activity if you’re feeling sick or you’ve tested positive.
• Don’t hang out indoors with groups of people who aren’t wearing masks.
• And if you’re not vaccinated, you need to take weekly COVID tests (or get vaccinated for free, right here on campus).

If you don’t follow these rules, you’ll be putting everyone around you at risk.  And you’ll be putting yourself at risk of a non-academic misconduct charge, which carries serious consequences.

But here’s the good news:  We have a highly effective vaccine … 90% of people on our campus are fully vaccinated … and our rules are pretty simple to follow.

Which is a way of saying get ready for game days at Camp Randall … popcorn on the Union Terrace …   trivia competitions … intramural sports from basketball to pickleball … and the best Innertube Waterpolo Tournament you’ve ever seen!

Three Pieces of Advice

Let me exercise my privilege as chancellor to give you three pieces of advice.

First, your primary reason to be at UW is to learn…to be a student.  So take your academic work seriously.

This is a challenging place.  The classes are rigorous, and you’ll need to keep up with the readings and do the homework.  Your parents may still try to nag you, but it’s just not the same when they aren’t here in person.  So it’s up to you to get the work done.

You have heard this, but I going to repeat it:  High-risk drinkers jeopardize their own heath and well-being and make our campus less welcoming and less safe for everyone.  So take care of yourself and think about the kind of community you want to create.

My second piece of advice is, ask for help when you need it.

Like many of you, I am from right here in the upper Midwest – I grew up in Minnesota.  I learned from my family that I should take care of my own problems and not bother other people with them.  Does that sound familiar?  That really wasn’t the best thing to learn.  Just because you CAN do things on your own doesn’t mean you SHOULD.

The faculty, staff, and advisers are here to work with you and to help you.  We admitted you because we know you can be successful here.  So when you hit snags, let us help.

My third and final piece of advice comes from Tina Marshalek (marshall-ick), who graduated in May.  She was a first-generation college student who’d been homeschooled through high school. She started at Madison College and then transferred to UW.

When she got here, it seemed like lots of other students were talking about backpacking through Europe while she’d been working to pay her bills.  And it seemed like everyone felt really confident, while she felt pretty nervous a lot of the time – and she started to wonder whether this was the right place for her.

So she decided that she was going to push herself to try things that felt a little scary, like asking questions in class and getting involved in student government.

She said:  I had to prove myself … to myself.

But she also knew she needed a way to relax, so she joined Knit for a Cause, where she could meet friends and do something she loved to do.

She studied hard, found a major that fit her interests and skills, volunteered in the community, and met lifelong friends here.  And she went on to win one of the top academic awards in the U.S. (a Truman Scholarship), which she will use for graduate school.

There are lots of ways to reach a little beyond your comfort zone:

• Learn to sail on Lake Mendota.
• Try a class in something you know nothing about.
• Get to know students who grew up in a place far away from where you’ve lived.

If you’re like the rest of us, you’re probably a little more comfortable with people whose names and faces and language are like your own.  And it’s a little too easy to hang out just with that group.  But in 2021, one of the most important skills to learn for your future career is how to live and work effectively in a diverse and global community.

Dr. Reesor told you about some of the in-person activities we have planned and she mentioned ‘Our Wisconsin’, which is going to help you recognize and challenge the assumptions you probably don’t even realize you make about other people.

Go Big Read

One thing that will bring all of us together is reading and talking about this fall’s Go Big Read book, which is called Transcendent Kingdom.  It’s a work of fiction by Yaa Gyasi (yah jahsy).  You’ll receive a copy on your way out.

Go Big Read is basically the biggest book club you’ve ever seen.  Thousands of people – on campus and around the community – will be reading this book. Your professors might incorporate it into discussions (last year 200 course sections use our Go Big Read book) and we’ll have a conversation with the author when she comes to campus in November.

Transcendent Kingdom is about a young woman named Gifty whose family immigrated to the U.S. from Ghana.  She’s a graduate student at Stanford University – a black woman scientist struggling to find that spot in the universe where she fits.

The book explores race and immigration … family and faith … mental illness, love, and how we figure out where we belong.

No matter where you come from or what your life experiences have been, you will find something in this book that you can relate to.

Conclusion

You have come to a university with a long and proud commitment to changing the world by actively engaging on issues that affect people’s lives.

Each of you has a different background, but you now share a common identity as Badgers.  That’s an identity you can claim for the rest of your life:  you are students – and one day will be alumni – of one of the greatest universities in the world.

We want to celebrate our new Badgers with two time-honored UW traditions – singing Varsity and eating Babcock Ice Cream.

Of course, we can’t do both at once.

We’ll sing here, and eat ice cream at Alumni Park, next to Memorial Union, courtesy of the Wisconsin Alumni Association.

Congratulations on being here at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and my very best wishes for your time here as a student.

Now please join me in welcoming one very special Badger… we can’t do this without him! (Bucky enters)

After we sing, please remain standing for the faculty recession.

Please rise as you are able and the UW Marching Band will lead us in Varsity.

(via Zoom)

Fri, June 18, 2021

9:05 a.m.

Thank you, Dean Samba, for that kind introduction, and thanks to all of you for joining today.  Your advice, expertise, and generosity have helped WSB get through this very challenging year.

Over this past year and all of its crises, I have been reminded again and again of our good fortune to have alumni and friends who are deeply dedicated to supporting UW.

I am happy to tell you that we are planning for a more normal fall semester:

• We’ve vaccinated more than 40,000 people – members of the community as well as our faculty, staff, and students – that’s the key to being able to return in-person.
• The Union Terrace reopened to the public last month

• We re-started in-person tours last month and they immediately booked up – nearly 700 students contacted us in just the first 2 weeks to take a tour.

• Some of our best student tour guides are from the B-school.

• On May 8, we held commencement in Camp Randall Stadium. It was the first big in-person event any of our graduates had seen in over a year – you could feel their energy and excitement.

• We have a new athletic director – Chris McIntosh

While it’s been a relief to start thinking about being together in-person again on campus, we still face enormous challenges.  I want to tell you about some of them, and about the opportunities I see moving forward, but first let me start in the right place with some good news from the year.

Good news at UW & WSB

We have missed a lot of what makes the university so special this year but we’ve also have had a lot to celebrate.

• UW-Madison is now one of the top 10 public universities in the country in graduation rates.

• And we’ve decreased the time it takes to get a degree – the average undergraduate now earns their degree in less than 4 years. Which also reduces student debt — 57% of our undergraduates graduated debt-free last spring.

• Thanks to the generous support of our alumni, we are able to guarantee – for the first time in our history – that every WI student who can qualify for admission and whose family makes less than the state’s median income will receive funding to cover tuition and fees for 4 years. One in 5 WI freshmen is now covered by Bucky’s Tuition Promise.

• BTP is a great complement to WSB’s BEL that has allowed us to compete on a national level for outstanding students of color who could go anywhere. Thank you for helping make this possible.

• We continue to be a hot school for new students. This year we’ve received 54,000 applications for about 7,500 spots in the freshman class – a new record.

• Some of the strongest demand we’re seeing is at WSB, where we’ve seen more than 50% growth in applications in the last 5 years.

• Admission is extremely competitive – acceptance rate for direct admits is around 24% this year.

• We are also seeing growing interest from students of color, both campus-wide and at WSB.

• The number of students in this year’s freshman class from underrepresented groups was the highest in our history and we anticipate that the next freshman class will be even more diverse.

WSB’s numbers are equally impressive.

• The initiative that began in 2017 to grow enrollment by increasing direct admits has helped us attract a much broader and more diverse pool of talent.

• The incoming class of direct admits to WSB is the largest and most diverse ever — 27% come from underrepresented backgrounds.

• Growing the direct-admit program also means most business students now spend a full four years at WSB instead of just two or three, which gives us a great opportunity to reshape the student experience and strengthen our reputation by investing in curriculum redesign … stronger career pathways … and infrastructure.

Looking forward:  Innovating in a highly competitive environment

All of these achievements – both at the central campus level and at WSB are a part of a conscious strategy to both expand and improve the quality and reach of our educational programs.  We’re doing this in three ways.:

• Expanding U/G class size while expanding quality at the same time
• Improving the quality and scope of campus offerings
• Moving more aggressively into the online space

I’ll say a few words about each of these.

#1 – expanding U/G class size:  We are close to the end of a 5-year initiative to increase the size of the freshman class by about 250 students a year.

This is a way to respond to demographic shifts in WI that are shrinking the number of high school graduates, and a way to take advantage of a growing pool of outstanding out-of-state applicants.  I want to emphasize that we are maintaining our strong commitment to WI students, and have been admitting a higher share of WI high school graduates in recent years than ever before.

At the same time, we’ve expanded our numbers of out-of-state students, where our pool has doubled in the last 10 years while also rising in quality.  Applications from CA, NY, and NJ have been especially strong – to those of you from those states, thank you for continuing to talk up UW and send us great students.

#2 – Improving the quality and scope of campus offerings:  We can’t just bring students in – we have to maintain and improve quality and we’re doing that with:

• Better academic and career advising

• New programs to improve diversity and make this campus a place where all people can feel that they belong

• And a sharper focus on educational excellence.

WSB has led the way with some really creative new curriculum options such as the programs leading from the BBA directly into a one-year master’s degree … and new degrees like the Master of Science in Business Analytics (MSBA).

• As you know, the MSBA launched just a few months before the pandemic hit – it’s never easy to get a new academic program off the ground, and we didn’t know what the pandemic effect would be. I am delighted to hear that the MSBA nearly doubled in size in its first year – and it’s on track to double again this fall.

One of the keys to creating vibrant new programs is bringing in outstanding new faculty.

• Last August we welcomed a record-breaking number of new faculty – including 6 in the B-School – and 10 more coming into WSB this fall. These hires have significantly increased gender and ethnic diversity at WSB – critical for maintaining a highly ranked program.

• Competing for outstanding faculty from underrepresented backgrounds is a priority campus-wide and at WSB. But it’s also a challenge.

• To help, we’ve created a program called TOP to help departments go after faculty members from groups that are underrepresented in their field. We’ve invested a lot of money in this program and it’s really helped us attract some faculty we wouldn’t otherwise have been able to hire.  One of our newest hires – Aziza Jones in Marketing – is a TOP hire.  I know Dean Samba and his team worked very hard to bring her in.

I applaud the Dean’s initiatives to create an environment at WSB that is welcoming and inclusive – I know there’s a new multicultural center in the works and a variety of other initiatives to ensure that every student we bring in will be able to thrive here.

#3 – moving more aggressively into the online space:  Online options allow us to bring a UW-Madison degree within reach for more non-traditional undergraduates, which will be important as the pool of high-school graduates shrinks.

We have long taught professional master’s degree programs online and we successfully piloted our first online undergraduate degree program last fall.

We are introducing 4 new online undergraduate degrees this fall … and 3 of them are in the B-school (2 different BBAs in Business Management and a BBA in Marketing).

We’re making a major investment in this, but the rewards should be substantial as these programs grow over time and allow us to serve

new students.

Budget

I opened by telling you about some of our accomplishments this year.  Perhaps the biggest accomplishment of all was to operate successfully through the pandemic.  We transformed almost all of our operations – from how we teach to how we ventilate the buildings – to make it possible for us to welcome thousands of students who wanted to be in Madison.  There were bumps along the way, but we responded quickly and we kept infection rates on campus very low for the entire year, after a first spike at the beginning of the fall semester.

Unfortunately, this health crisis also created a budget crisis.  We have been dealing with a financial crisis bigger than anything we’ve seen in a single year.  We project a loss of $320m, a combination of lost revenues + COVID expenses.

The biggest losses are in a few areas:

• Athletic revenues are down $50m;
• Our dorm and cafeteria revenues are down about $50m;
• And the state took $50m back at the start of the pandemic, requiring us to return budget money that had been allocated.

Much of our revenue will come back quickly in the fall, so this is primarily a short-term cash flow problem.  But it’s a big problem!

Fortunately, we went into 2020 in a strong financial position, and we received some federal relief funds that were very helpful.  We implemented a variety of cost-cutting measures – we passed along budget cuts across the university, and imposed a year of furloughs on all employees.  And we used quite a bit of reserve dollars.  With these measures, we’ve filled our short-term cash flow problem, but our employees will tell you it hasn’t been an easy year.

Of course, the legislature is now working on the state budget, setting our state dollars for the next two years.  Given this past year, I was really hoping that the state would provide us with some new dollars to position us to move forward.

At the end of May, the Joint Finance Committee made their recommendations, which typically ends up being pretty close to the final budget.  Unfortunately, they are recommending virtually no new dollars for higher education, which will make our recovery from the pandemic that much harder.

This underscores the importance of our work to build programs that fill an educational need while also generating revenue – and the importance of philanthropy.

I’m even more unhappy that they did not include any of the financial flexibilities that we requested.

• The first would allow us to borrow money for short-term operational purposes, something every other flagship university in the country can do and which is critical in a crisis.

• Example: Athletics has lost $50m.  A loan from the campus would allow them to maintain a full staff so they’re ready to go when in-person events return.

• The second would allow us to invest a portion of our cash balances in safe, medium-term investments that earn a little return. This is $10m-$20m a year to us.

It’s possible that we might get a separate bill passed for the working capital investments, but it’s disappointing that none of this will be in the state budget.

The one piece of good news in the budget is that – after eight years – they are proposing the end the tuition freeze.  Our in-state tuition is among the lowest in the Big 10.  Both tuition and fees together are around $10,500.   Minnesota’s in-state tuition is about $3500 higher; so is Illinois’; and Michigan’s.  Now, we’re not going to raise tuition by a lot this year, but I do hope this gives us some options in the years ahead to move our in-state tuition closer to where it is in our neighboring states.

The primary issue isn’t tuition levels – it’s the tuition families have to pay.  We’ve implemented Bucky’s Tuition Promise to assure low-income in-state families that their tuition will be paid.   This should make it possible to ask higher-income families to pay a little more for one of the top public schools in the country.

Conclusion

After all of the challenges we’ve faced this year, it felt like a real gift to be able to send our graduates off with an in-person commencement ceremony last month.  Among the many highlights was a moment during the introduction of the platform party – a number of university leaders had already been introduced to polite applause and then we came to Dean Samba, and the cheers from the WSB graduates echoed all over the stadium.

That says all you need to know about the affinity our students have for this school and its outstanding Dean.

Dean Samba has been a great leader.  In just 18 months on the job and in the midst of a global pandemic, he has:

• Built a sustainable financial model for WSB;

• Created new programs that improve quality and raise the school’s national profile – including a set of strategies to achieve a top 10 undergraduate ranking (now #21, up from #33 in 2019);

• Despite uncertainty created by the pandemic, WSB demonstrated great resilience, working hard to connect students with companies.
• We had 86% placement of WSB undergraduates in 2020
• We anticipate the Class of 2021 will exceed 90%
• This says a lot about the reputation of this school, the quality of our graduates, and the networks you have helped us to build.

• It also says something about the Dean’s commitment to building stronger and better relationships with our stakeholders who see a thoughtful leader who listens to their ideas and concerns.  And he’s earned a reputation as the ultimate good sport, whether he’s taking selfies with 500 incoming students or singing Bon Jovi tunes at online fundraisers.

In all of this, you have been our trusted partners – thank you for your dedication to the university and WSB.  Thank you for making sure the school played a central role in the All Ways Forward campaign.  We’ll be celebrating the end of that campaign this fall.  It’s been our most successful fundraising campaign ever – I’m optimistic we’re going to end at $4 billion in new money raised.  That’s going to be a game-changer for the B-School and the entire campus.

I want to see all of you on campus in the fall…for a game, for a visit, and for our campaign celebration.   Thank you and I’ll be happy to take questions.

Thurs May 13, 2021

10:20 a.m.

Thank you Kurt/Mike for that kind introduction and for all that you and the WMC directors are doing to help Wisconsin businesses to survive this very challenging year.

I also want to congratulate WMC on being named “State Chamber of the Year” by the Council of State Chambers.  To win a major national award for innovation and service would be a great honor in any year – but in this year, it is truly a remarkable achievement – congratulations!

You invited me to talk about finances and the state budget, and I want to share with you several budget initiatives that I am hoping you’ll help us advocate for.  But first let me give you a quick update on what’s happening on campus.

Points of Pride

This was a strange year for all of us.  At UW, we really missed the personal interactions that are part of university life, and many of the things that make the university so special – from Badger games to an afternoon on the Terrace.

But at the same time, we had a lot to celebrate this year:

• We are now one of the top 10 public universities in the country in graduation rates.

• We’ve also decreased the time it takes to get a degree – the average undergraduate now earns their degree in less than 4 years. Which also reduces student debt — 57% of our undergraduates graduated last year with no student-loan debt.

• Thanks to the generous support of our alumni, we are able to guarantee – for the first time in our history – that every WI student who can qualify for admission and whose family makes less than the state’s median income will receive funding to cover tuition and fees for 4 years. One in 5 WI freshmen is now covered by the program we call Bucky’s Tuition Promise.

• And we continue to be a hot school for new students. We’ve received 54,000 applications for about 7,500 spots in the freshman class – a new record.

We also continue to be a research powerhouse – one of the nation’s top 10.

• Our researchers are working in many different fields – but of course a main focus has been COVID. We’ve brought in $50m in federal grants this year to fund 74 different COVID-related projects.

• We invest about $1.3b a year in cutting-edge science that’s saving lives and improving the world. Those aren’t state tax dollars; they’re federal dollars and private grants we bring into Wisconsin every year.

• Most of those dollars stay here in Wisconsin. We released a new study earlier this spring that shows our economic impact in this state is $30b a year.  $30 billion – that’s about 10% of the state’s GDP ($306B)

We are planning to be back to normal – or at least as close to normal as possible – when fall semester opens.

• We have now vaccinated more than 35,000 people – members of the community as well as our faculty, staff, and students. Getting almost all of our community vaccinated is the best way to assure next fall goes smoothly.

• The Union Terrace reopened to the public this week.

• The marching band has resumed practice

• And last Saturday, we graduated 7,600 students at in-person commencement ceremonies at Camp Randall Stadium. After the year they’ve had, it was great to be able to send them off with a big celebration.

I would also note that we have some changes in athletics coming.  We have a national search underway to replace Barry Alvarez (and of course no one will ever really replace Coach Alvarez)

Talent Pipeline

As you know, one of our most important roles in the state is to deliver a set of talented workers with strong skills.

UW-Madison is uniquely positioned to expand the pool of talent for state businesses:

• We’re working to keep top Wisconsin students here in Wisconsin and bringing in students from other states.

• 20,000 of our current undergraduate and graduate students are from outside Wisconsin. Applications from out-of-state students are up by double digits this year. This is a huge influx of talent into the state…we work closely with the business community to help keep as many of them here as possible after they graduate.

• We confer more than 10,000 degrees every year and, since 2018, a majority of them have been in STEM or healthcare fields.

CDIS

A little less than two years ago, we opened our new School of Computer, Data and Information Sciences.

• CDIS is already a magnet for students from all over the state, the nation, and the world.

• It now has more than 2,400 undergrad majors across 4 programs and nearly 900 graduate students. Computer Science is our largest major.

• Students from all over campus are taking advantage of the opportunity to add some new tech skills to their resume through a certificate for non-majors. One introductory class last fall enrolled students from 72 different majors.

• We opened a new Data Science major this year and have a suite of data science and information degrees and certificates in the works.

Entrepreneurship Education

Entrepreneurship education has been another major growth area.

• We enrolled more than 3,000 students from 11 different schools and colleges in our entrepreneurship classes this year.

Our hope is to support entrepreneurship as an important contributor to the state’s economy.

Innovation Ecosystem

We know there is significant room for growth spurred by UW-Madison innovation, and we’ve put together an innovation ecosystem to nourish entrepreneurship and support tech transfer.  There are many different components – let me tell you about three that might interest you:

• The Office of Business Engagement which is making it easier for industry partners to collaborate with us on research projects and recruit top talent.

• The Discovery-to-Product program which works in partnership with WARF to help faculty, staff and students bridge the gap between innovative ideas and commercial reality.

• And our newest initiative – also in partnership with WARF – is called Promoting Industry Collaboration. It will fund Ph.D. students to work as interns with a industry partner for 1-2 years on an invention or innovation related to their research.  We are now in the process of reviewing 32 proposals.

Thoughout this pandemic, we have continued to operate all of these programs and many more, to fulfill our mission as a public university.  Which brings me to a few comments about our budget.

Finances

The pandemic has created a financial crisis bigger than anything we’ve seen before.

We project a total loss of nearly $320m.  That’s a combination of losses in revenue plus COVID-related expenses.  The biggest losses are in a few areas – for example:

• Athletic revenues are down $50m;
• Our housing and dining revenues are down about $50m;
• And the state took $50m back this past spring and fall, requiring us to return budget money we thought had been allocated to our campus.

We are planning for a normal semester in the fall, and much of our revenue will come back quickly, so this is a short-term cash flow problem.  But it’s a big problem!

We are managing these losses with both short-term fixes and long-term adjustments, including using reserves, asking all employees to take furloughs, and passing budget cuts of around 5% on to all units.  But given our financial issues, I care even more than usual about the state budget.

State Budget

Governor Evers’ budget is very positive for UW.  We’re working with the legislature to retain as many of the Governor’s recommendations as possible, and I hope you will stand with us to ask the legislature to:

• Support some increase in base budget for UW System and its schools

• Support modern financial tools for the university. Governor Evers has proposed two that are absolutely necessary:

1. Short-term borrowing to support operations; and
2. The ability to invest our working capital.

• Short-term borrowing:

• A financial tool available to every one of our peer schools and is critical to be able to continue operations in a crisis.

• Example: The $50m loss in Athletics.  A short-term (3-5 year) loan at up to $40-50m would help ensure that the department does not need to lay off outstanding staff who will be needed as soon as the pandemic is over.

• Ability to invest working capital:

• We want to remove the byzantine rules that govern how our working funds are held. Changes to these rules would allow us to manage our working capital like most other organizations of our size.

• This will allow us to take some of our cash balances out of accounts where they’re earning essentially zero and into safe, medium-term investment funds that earn a little more.

• This is worth $10-$20m/year to UW-Madison. It’s a small fix that really matters to allow us to manage our finances responsibly.

Capital Budget

We’re also trying to get two new academic buildings built.

• One on the Engineering campus that would allow us to increase undergraduate enrollment by 1,000 students – something companies in Wisconsin have been asking for as they seek to hire more engineers. It would also give us new space for hands-on teaching and research.

• And a new L&S academic building that is part of a series of projects to allow us to move out of our crumbling Humanities building.

• Humanities was built in 1969 and it’s got all the warmth and functionality of a big, uninsulated concrete box.

• Over the course of a typical year, we have 60 different departments teaching about 70,000 credit hours there – everything from Introductory Biology to Modern Literature.

• We just conducted an engineering review at Humanities that found enough potential safety issues that we’ve shut down portions of that building.

Both of these buildings were included in the Governor’s budget.  We’re committed to raising 1/3 of the cost of these buildings, and we’re asking the state to support the remainder.

This year has highlighted the value of a highly educated workforce and the value of scientific research – and after the losses of this past year, we need state support to recover and to plan forward.  This is how we continue to compete nationally and globally for the best and brightest students – your future employees.

There are two ways you and your members can help:

• Ask key members of the legislature to support UW in the upcoming state budget

• Keep talking about UW and sending great students to us.

Thank you for your partnership over the years.  I’ll be happy to take your questions.

UW-Madison Spring Commencement Ceremony for Doctoral, MFA and Professional Degree Candidates

Camp Randall Stadium

Sat May 8, 2021

4:00 p.m.

Good afternoon.   Welcome to Camp Randall Stadium and the 2021 graduate school commencement of the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

After one of the strangest years any of us has ever experienced, many of you are here – together and in-person – to celebrate.  And it feels great!

Thank you, DaSean Stokes and Sarah Brailey, for that beautiful performance.

Thank you, Provost Karl Scholz, for the kind introduction.

And thank you to John Gottman, who receives an honorary degree today.  Dr. Gottman could not be here in person, but you will hear from him shortly and I think you will be inspired – as I have been – by his unique ability to see a problem in a way nobody’s ever considered before.  He is world-renowned for his research on marriage.  The mathematicians in the crowd will appreciate that he’s particularly well-known as one of the first people to utilize differential equations to model and describe interactions between couples.

I also want to take a moment to recognize the departure of Barry Alvarez, our Athletic Director, who is retiring after 31 years here at UW.  Under his leadership, our Badger teams have won multiple national championships … our student athletes have been recognized for top academic achievement … and our football program has been singled out as the most admired in the country, not just because we win but because of our students’ academic success and community engagement!

Thank you, Barry, for giving us so many reasons to cheer over the last three decades.

To the graduates here in person and members of this class joining us on the livestream:

Today we mark the years of sustained effort you have invested to work at the highest levels in your field … and the sacrifices you have made along the way.

Just months ago, few of us imagined that we would be able to be together today.  You have made this moment possible with your careful attention to health protocols that keep yourself, and others, healthy.

I know it hasn’t been an easy year, but you’ve handled it with grace and even a sense of humor – one of our students recently observed that he can no longer walk past Union South – where he went twice a week to test – without drooling.

I want to say a special word to the estimated 40,000 parents, spouses, partners, children, siblings and friends who are with us today on the livestream:

This is your celebration too.  I want to thank you for the years of support and sacrifice that have brought your graduate to this day.

To those graduates who have lost friends, colleagues, and family members – to the pandemic or for other causes – we remember all of them as well.

An extraordinary year

This has been an extraordinary year.  We have seen a convergence of crises:

• The pandemic
• Economic uncertainty
• Political polarization
• And a new level of urgency to take meaningful action against racism and injustice, and to put an end to violence against Black and brown people, people of Asian descent, and all others who have been targets of hate crimes in this country.

These things have affected all of you – but some of you have faced particular challenges.  You deserve special recognition today.  Please stand as you are able and remain standing:

• If you taught undergraduate classes in-person this year.
• If you had to figure out how to teach remotely this year.
• If you do clinical work, or research related to COVID-19, or have helped with testing and vaccination clinics.
• If you are a first-responder or a front-line worker.
• If you had a child learning at home rather than in school or preschool.

For all that you have accomplished under especially stressful circumstances, please give yourselves, and one another, a round of applause.

You can be seated.

I know that many of you also have faced financial hardship. And all of you have experienced the diminution of two things that are at the heart of who we are and what we do here at UW-Madison:

1. Interdisciplinary collaboration with partners across the campus and around the world, and

2. Public outreach to share knowledge beyond the borders of the campus (what we call the Wisconsin Idea).

These are things that depend on connections between people.  And this university has always been a place that fosters those connections.  They’re built on a thousand small moments – the conversation in the hallway that gives you a new way of thinking about something … Friday afternoons with your lab partners on the Terrace … or coffee with a friend.

COVID has taken so much from so many.  But it has also taught us something really valuable, which it’s easy to lose sight of in graduate school:

How to think like a beginner.

The great cellist YoYo Ma credits his remarkable ability to connect with audiences to his beginner’s mind, which he describes as:

Being receptive to what’s around you and being present without judgment.

A beginner’s approach to communication

When we lost the ability to see one another face-to-face, to take note of all of those non-verbal cues that say: I understand you or I’m confused, we all had to start over learning how to communicate in different ways.  To listen better, pace ourselves differently, and ask more questions.

Those of you who teach have experienced this daily … as have those of you whose research depends on building and maintaining relationships with communities across Wisconsin and around the world.

Sarah Alexander is a great example.  Sarah graduates today with a Ph.D. in Civil and Environmental Engineering.  Sarah where are you?  [Briefly up on Jumbotron]

Sarah worked with partners in Ethiopia to develop novel approaches for predicting seasonal rainfall and communicating with farmers and communities about uncertain climate conditions to help them build more resilient systems.

Her work is also going to be important right here in Wisconsin – but it will only be helpful if the information she has is communicated effectively to those who can use it.

Without the ability to travel to Ethiopia for in-person workshops, Sarah and her partners worked with people in the community who brought farmers together outdoors and held a megaphone up to a cellphone.  It wasn’t ideal, but with this set-up, the research team was able to share critically important information.

No matter your field, COVID has forced you to do some things you probably haven’t done before, using new technologies and reaching out to people in different ways.

I suspect this has sharpened your communications skills.  And you will need those skills as you go into a world that doesn’t always believe in science – but that urgently needs the solutions only science can provide.

A beginner’s approach to life

COVID has taught us to view other facets of our lives through a beginner’s lens as well.  And it turns out that examining everything you do, and figuring out a different way to do it, teaches you a few things that are really worth knowing, like:

• What is essential and what isn’t
• How to be flexible with yourself and others
• And what energizes you or makes you feel depleted.

So many of you have stories about the things you’ve decided to stop doing, or the things you’ve discovered, or re-discovered this past year:

• Some of you are playing more guitar or learning a new instrument.

• Some of you are learning to meditate or taking an online yoga class

• And some of you are just carving out time to take long walks.

These activities aren’t simply pleasant distractions – they are essential to your well-being and help re-energize you for your work.

When Albert Einstein came upon a problem that stumped him, he’d step away and play his violin.  Isaac Newton and Carl Sagan would pick up their pens and write.  Beatrix Potter created Peter Rabbit as an outlet for the frustrations she encountered as a woman in science.

I hope you will continue to try activities that give you a chance to be a beginner again.

And I hope you will stay connected to your fellow graduate students, your colleagues for life.  They will always laugh and cry with you, and be there to celebrate victories large and small, no matter how many years go by.

Conclusion

After today, with your graduate degree, you will be part of the very powerful community of the most highly educated people in the world.  That gives you the responsibility to use your education wisely – to make the world around you a better place.

And you are also part of the Badger family of alumni – more than 450,000 strong.

Thank you for being part of this community.  Best wishes as you set off on the next stage of your journey.  Wherever you go, be sure to come back and visit us every so often here in Madison and tell us how you’re doing.

Congratulations … and On Wisconsin!

UW-Madison Spring Commencement Ceremony

Camp Randall Stadium

Sat May 8, 2021

Noon

Thank you, Ben Galvin, for that beautiful performance.

Good afternoon.  I am Chancellor Rebecca Blank.  After one of the strangest years any of us has ever experienced, it feels great to be able to say:

Welcome to Camp Randall Stadium and the 168^th spring commencement of the University of Wisconsin at Madison!

Today we confer degrees on nearly 5,500 undergraduates.  Many of you are here in person, and many others are joining on the livestream.  Today we celebrate all of you as you become alumni of one of the greatest universities in the world – but there is one group that I want to call out for special recognition:

If you are the first generation in your family to earn a college degree, please stand as you are able.

I know your families and friends are proud today.  Congratulations on this tremendous accomplishment!

Please be seated.

I also want to take a moment to recognize the departure of Barry Alvarez, our Athletic Director, who is retiring after 31 years here at UW.  Under his leadership, our Badger teams have won multiple national championships … our student athletes have been recognized for top academic achievement … and our football program has been singled out as the most admired in the country, not just because we win but because of our students’ academic success and community engagement!

Thank you, Barry, for giving us so many reasons to cheer over the last three decades.

Impact of COVID

Just a few months ago, we still weren’t sure whether we’d be jumping around in Camp Randall Stadium today.

Every graduate who has sat where you sit has faced many challenges to reach this moment – but few of them have faced the extraordinary challenges you have:

• The sudden switch to virtual learning last spring.

• The anxiety about your health and the health of your loved ones.

• The difficult choices about whether study in person or remotely this year … and whether to live in Madison or at home.

• And those twice-a-week tests I know you won’t miss.

• Believe me, I never thought I’d find myself sending out instructions on how to drool!

• But you’ve handled it with grace and even a sense of humor. One of our students said her new motto is “Always be pooling.”

But nobody got here alone.

There were days when things didn’t go quite the way you wanted:

• When that internship you’d hoped for fell through
• When that exam didn’t go so well
• When the relationship you thought was forever turned out … not to be.
• Some of you lost friends and family members over these years – to the pandemic or for other causes.

When you needed help and said  I’m not sure I can do this, there were friends, family, professors, and advisors who told you, I believe in you, and I will help.

For all of the parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, siblings and friends who are with us today on the livestream:  This is your celebration too.  Thank you for the support and sacrifices that you have made to help bring your graduate to this day.

Please join me in thanking all of them:

An extraordinary year

Your time here at UW has been capped by an extraordinary year, with a convergence of crises:

• The pandemic
• Economic uncertainty
• Political polarization
• And a new level of urgency to take meaningful action against racism and injustice, and to put an end to violence against Black and brown people, people of Asian descent, and all others who have been targets of hate crimes in this country.

These things have affected all of you – and you’ve responded in the proud tradition of this great university, by standing up … speaking out … and looking for ways to make things better.

Some of you answered the call to be on front lines of the pandemic – you deserve special recognition.  Please stand as you are able and remain standing:

• If you helped with COVID testing or vaccination (where are the School of Nursing graduates?) or in other health care setting.

• If you worked as a Badger Wellness Ambassador.

• If you helped to raise awareness of mental health concerns and how to seek help.

• If you worked in Housing, Dining, in the Unions … or in any other campus job that helped us keep the campus safe and open.

• If you are a member of the Wisconsin National Guard or a branch of the armed services that was called to duty in the pandemic.

Thank you all!

You may be seated.

Many more of you have done a thousand small things to lift one another up:

• When classmates had no way to travel home for Thanksgiving, you were there with meal kits from the Open Seat Food Pantry.

• When student employees couldn’t gather for each other’s birthdays, you were there to deliver cupcakes and flowers to each person’s doorstep.

• And in those moments when a friend just needed to talk, you were there for them, too.

You’ve also done some pretty big things.  When the pandemic threatened to put on hold the longtime dream of honoring UW’s historically Black fraternities and sororities with a special place on campus, members of this class said:  We will make this happen.

• And two weeks ago, we dedicated the space for the new Divine Nine Garden Plaza.

Congratulations and thank you for seeing it through.

Conclusion

You are graduating into a world that looks very different than the one you planned for.  Just as wars and terrorist attacks shaped your grandparents’ and parents’ generation, this pandemic will shape yours.

This year has helped to reveal qualities in each of you that are essential to building a happy and productive life in this new world.  Reslience.  Persistence.  Flexibility.  Awareness of your own needs, and the needs of others.  And kindness.

Despite the challenges of this year, you’ve nurtured friendships, found ways to have fun, and are here in Camp Randall celebrating your graduation

My wish for you, in the words of the late, great author Maya Angelou, is that you will:

Continue to be who you are, and to astonish a mean world

with your acts of kindness.

Best wishes to all of you on wherever life takes you next.  But be sure to come back and visit us – we want to know how you’re doing.

To all of you here in person and on the livestream – from Beijing, China … to San Francisco … to Wausau, Wisconsin, and every point in between – thank you for being part of our big Badger family and thanks for all you’ve given to the campus community during your time here.

Congratulations, Class of 2021 and On, Wisconsin!

Congratulations, UW-Madison Class of 2021!

I’m Chancellor Rebecca Blank and I am delighted to have this opportunity to congratulate you on all that you’ve accomplished over the past four years.

To the friends and family … teachers and staff … mentor-friends … fellow students and alumni who are celebrating with our graduates:

This is your night, too.

Thank you for all that you have done to support these amazingly talented students across the finish line!

We have more than 120 Chancellor’s and Powers-Knapp Scholars graduating next month … that’s pretty impressive when you consider this program began with just 6 students.  They were nicknamed the Fantastic Six – for good reason.  They set high standards.

Every student who comes to UW is in the process of growing and learning and figuring out a direction for their life.  But not everyone faces the same challenges.  For some of you, it was harder to get here and you might have faced more differences in expectations and culture than many other students.

This year has been particularly hard:

• Some of you have lost loved ones
• You’ve worried about your health, and your family
• You’ve worried about money
• You’ve worried about finding internships and jobs
• And you’ve been isolated from the people who have supported you and made this place feel like home.

But you never gave up.  You have met every challenge with resilience and strength, and support for one another – and you have kept longtime traditions alive, even when it meant another long Zoom meeting at the end of a very long day.

One of those traditions is the senior class ‘Give Back’– our seniors raise money for the next class of Scholars.  This year, in the midst of a global pandemic, it seemed like we might break with that tradition.

But the Class of 2021 wasn’t going to be stopped.  I want to thank you – your gift is going to help support future Scholars in the program.

In your time on this campus, we have raised record donations among our alumni for Chancellor’s and PKS Scholars within the Mercile J. Lee Scholars Program – and we’ve just kicked off a new alumni fundraising campaign that we are really excited about.  The Raimey-Noland Fund is named for Mabel Raimey and William Noland, the first known African American female and male graduates of UW-Madison.

The campaign will support scholarships and programs aimed at increasing diversity, equity, and inclusion on this campus.

We have already raised $20M and we’re going keep aiming higher, because these Scholars have long been among our best and brightest students:

• They are academically strong
• They are deeply engaged in campus life
• Their graduation rates typically exceed those of our general student population
• And more than half of them will pursue graduate or professional degrees.

Members of this year’s class have been accepted into top medical schools, law schools, engineering and other graduate programs all over the country – including the University of Michigan, the University of Rochester, Cornell University, and of course UW-Madison.  

Graduates, you are well-prepared for whatever you decide to do next.  But I know that these last four years haven’t been easy – academically, socially, or emotionally.

Many of you have been part of a conversation about campus climate that has been painful and difficult – particularly this year:

• We’ve seen the pandemic exposing deep inequities as it has ravaged communities of color.

• We have literally watched people commit murders and read about hate crimes across over the country and the world.

• And we’ve seen the daily acts of racism and microaggessions that all people of color in this country experience.

Our work to address inequity and injustice, and to root out systemic racism feels more urgent than ever.

I want to thank those of you who have been deeply involved in helping us to make this campus … our state … and our country a place where no one has to live in fear because of the color of their skin, their ethnicity, religious beliefs, or gender identity.

I hope all of you are looking forward to your next chapter:

• Many of you are beginning graduate and professional programs.

• Some of you are beginning careers with corporations like Dell Technologies, Microsoft, and Pfizer.

• And some of you are pursuing public service through Teach for America … international exchange programs … and the armed forces.

You have accomplished much and made us proud.  And soon you will have a diploma that is your personal ticket to change the world.  I have no doubt you will succeed.

As you move on to your next challenge, I want you to know that our alumni will be there to support you.

I hope that each of you will stay connected to the program.  We want to hear how you’re doing, and celebrate your future achievements with you.

And every once in a while, I hope you will take a moment to read those words on the back of your medallion and remember: “Once a Scholar, Always a Scholar.”  Congratulations and On, Wisconsin!

Good afternoon.  Thank you Nyla and Israel, and thanks to:

• Lori Reesor, Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs, who has been a tireless advocate for our students, particularly in this very challenging year
• Cheryl Gittens, Interim Deputy Vice Chancellor for Diversity & Inclusion (and a member of Delta Sigma Theta)
• The National Pan-Hellenic Council
• The alumni and Council members who have advocated for, and supported, N-P-H-C for many decades
• The generous donors who are making this project possible – especially Lou Holland, Jr., for his leadership gift in celebration of our students’ efforts. Lou’s father, Lou Holland, Sr., was a member of Kappa Alpha Psi here at UW-Madison.
• And the students who continue to inspire us with their talent, resilience, and determination.

This is a unique space that we are dedicating.  The plaza that will be here has been planned and organized by students in the past two years.  And students are helping us raise the money to create the space we all want here.

Five years ago, we did a campuswide survey to help us understand how people of color experience this university, so we could make it better.  And again and again, our students told us:

I’m tired of being the only person with brown skin in every class – I want to be able to look around and see people who look like me.

We’ve worked hard to bring in more diverse faculty, staff and students – and we have more work to do on that front. But attracting diverse scholars (while important) isn’t enough.  We have to be intentional about making people feel welcomed and included.

That starts with creating places where every person can see themselves and be themselves.

The student cultural centers are a good example – but they are (intentionally) a bit tucked away.

The Divine Nine Garden Plaza is just the opposite.  This space will anchor one of the busiest corridors on campus.  Thousands of people who pass through here will learn about the rich history and impact of the six NPHC chapters that have been an important part of the Wisconsin Experience for generations of UW students.

For many, this will be the first time they’ve heard of Black Greek life at UW.  Because although historically Black fraternities and sororities have been on this campus for 75 years, they have been largely left out of the university’s official history.

For others, this will be like seeing an old friend in an unexpected place and feeling instantly more at home.

And for all us here today, the Divine Nine Garden Plaza will be a reminder of the many values N-P-H-C and UW-Madison share – a commitment to education, community-building, public service, and creating connections between people.

To everyone who has played a role in bringing this dream to life – thank you.  I look forward to watching the garden plaza come together this summer, and to celebrating the grand opening in the fall.

And now, please join me in welcoming our Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs, Dr. Lori Reesor.

Thank you, Andre, and thanks to you and your team for bringing us all together today.

I want to welcome all of the students, parents, and families who are joining us from Wisconsin and more than a dozen other states around the country – I hope you’ll take a moment to type your location into the chat.

Students, congratulations on your admission to UW-Madison!  We think you will make a great addition to this university, and we invited you to this special gathering to tell you personally that we want you here.

I know some of you have already decided to be part of the Class of 2025.  If you already know you want to be a Badger, I invite you to share one thing about yourself in the chat – where you grew up … what you’re thinking about majoring in … your favorite Badger sport … whatever comes to mind.

Whether or not you’ve made up your mind, you can feel good about your admission to UW-Madison.  This was the most competitive year in our history – we had 54,000 applications for about 7,500 spots in the freshman class.  That’s a new record for applications and a double-digit increase from last year.  Students really want to come to this university.

We have applicants from all over the country and more than 100 nations around the world.

Those of you here in Wisconsin might feel like you already know this campus pretty well – maybe even a little too well.  But I want you to be careful not to underrate us just because we’re nearby.  UW-Madison is one of the top public universities in the country – and you can come here at in-state prices and have a world-class experience.

Why bigger is better

This university has a breadth and scope that is hard to find anywhere else.  You can choose from nearly 130 majors – and we’ve added some new ones that we’re really excited about, including:

• A BS in Global Health
• A BS in Data Science
• And a BBA in Supply Chain Management

The Data Science major is in our School of Computer, Data and Information Sciences that we opened two years ago in response to enormous growth in the number of students majoring in computer science – it’s now the #1 major on campus.

No matter what you major in, you may want to take a course or two in computer science or even earn a certificate.

We have more than 70 certificate programs that will allow you to earn an additional credential in a wide range of areas – from Environmental Studies to Entrepreneurship to Video Game Design.

Last year, more than half of our students graduated with degrees in one of the STEM fields – but I don’t want you to think we’re only a STEM school.  After computer science, the next three most-popular majors right now are economics, business, and psychology.

And we have:

• One of the top-rated history departments in the country
• An excellent group of social science departments
• A great communications and journalism program
• A top-ranked School of Education
• And a new music school with a performing arts center that opened in fall of 2019.

One of the wonderful things about UW-Madison is the breadth of academic fields:

• We teach 58 languages
• We offer nearly 7,000 different courses every year
• And you can design your own honors program where you’ll be part of a smaller group of students working closely with faculty mentors.

Lots of liberal arts colleges promote themselves by claiming that ‘small is beautiful.’  But when it comes to universities, I truly believe that ‘bigger is better.’

The student experience

Those of you from outside of Wisconsin might be worried that our campus will feel a little too big.  I want to assure you that you will make friends and find your place here, and we have a number of programs specially designed to help you do that.

Those of you from Wisconsin might be feeling like UW is … just a little too close to home – but let me assure you of two things:

• First, even if some of your high school friends (or non-friends) are coming to UW, you don’t ever have to see them or hang out with them once you’re here. We’re going to help you connect with new friends from all over the state, the country, and the world.

• Second, even if you’ve been at the Union, or at Badger games, I assure you that being on campus is a lot different than visiting You will find lots here that is new to you.

Let me tell you about some aspects of this campus you might not know about.

First:

UW-Madison is one of the top 10 research institutions in the country.

That matters to you because, as undergraduates, you will have opportunities to work alongside our faculty and staff on all sorts of fascinating research.  Nearly 40% of our undergraduates work on faculty research projects during their time here.

Our students are involved in projects like growing human spinal cord tissue to help people with debilitating injuries or exploring how ‘big data’ can help improve how elections are run.

No matter what your major, we want to be sure we give you all of the skills you will need to be successful in your career – which means learning to write and communicate effectively, to analyze and work with numbers, to speak another language, and to know something about history and music and art.

Second:

We have a record-high retention rate.  More than 95% of UW freshmen return for their sophomore year.

That tells us that the investments we’ve made in undergraduate education are paying off.   We been ranked one of the top public universities in the nation for our commitment to undergraduate teaching.

It also tells us that our students are having a great time here.

There is so much to do on this campus that your biggest problem might be knowing where to start.  We have 1,000 student clubs and organizations … a study-abroad program that sends students to 60 countries around the world  (we are the #2 university in the nation in terms of the number of students who spend a semester abroad)… and of course, Badger game days.

Campus has felt very different this year, but we are gearing up for a normal semester in the fall (though we might still be asking you to do things like wear a face covering).  I’m really excited to welcome all of our students back in person. 

Student story – Claire Evenson

Let me close by sharing a bit of advice from one of our top students who graduated in 2020.

Claire Evenson majored in biochemistry and math.  She grew up just outside of Madison and did really well in high school.  She had her choice of colleges but she loves Madison for its music scene and food, and the lakes … and she wanted to avoid taking out student loans.

When she arrived as a freshman, she asked her advisor right away about how to participate in faculty research projects and her advisor connected her with one of our professors who does DNA research.  She worked with him for the rest of her time here.

She also wanted to find a group to play music with, and to take clarinet lessons at our music school – she figured out how to do those things, too.

And then – as is true for many of our freshmen – Claire realized she’d taken on too much, too soon.  As she puts it:

I found the sheer number of opportunities overwhelming and I thought that I had to do everything at once. I’m all for getting involved, but I definitely overloaded myself.

She ended up dropping a handful of clubs she’d joined and backing out of a few things she’d committed to.  That was hard, but it was also smart.  It enabled her to focus on her academic work and a small number of things she was really excited about.

She went on to win two highly competitive national scholarships, and she was a finalist for the Rhodes Scholarship.  She is now working on a master’s degree at the University of Oxford in the U.K.

She asked me to share two pieces of advice with you:

First, if you come here next fall – and we hope you do – explore every organization and opportunity … but be very selective.  Don’t take on more than one or two extra things in your first semester.

Second, apply for campus scholarships.  Claire was surprised by the number of scholarships she found just by letting faculty and staff know she was looking.

And she wanted me to let you know that it really is possible to get through school with zero student-loan debt.  Last spring, 57% of our seniors graduated with zero student debt. Claire was one of them.

Conclusion

UW-Madison is a place where you’ll work harder than you might have imagined you could, alongside some of the world’s leading scholars … meet lifelong friends … and – let’s not forget –have a lot of fun, too.

And on that first game day, when you Jump Around in Camp Randall Stadium with 50,000 or so fellow Badgers … you will know that you are exactly where you belong.

I hope to see every one of you next September at Convocation.  Thank you for joining us, and I am happy to take your questions – either raise your hand or post in the chat.

Thank you Mike for that kind introduction – and a special thanks to the legislators who are serving on today’s panel.

I also want to thank the friends and alumni who are with us today.

If you’re comfortable doing so, please type your location into the chat so we can see where you’re joining us from.

Though I wish we could be together in person, virtual meetings are a lot easier to get to.  I am told that this is the largest group we’ve ever had for this event, and it’s wonderful to see so many new people along with those of you who have been attending regularly since we began this program 9 years ago.

Points of Pride

Before I talk about the budget, let me start in the right place – with some of the great things that are happening on our campus, which demonstrate why UW-Madison is one of the top public universities in the country.

Campus has been a different place with COVID.  We’ve really missed the personal interactions that are part of university life, and all of the things that make UW-Madison so special – from Badger games to an afternoon on the Terrace.

But at the same time, we have a lot to be proud of:

• We are one of the top 10 public universities in the country in our graduation rates.

• We’ve also decreased the time it takes to get a degree – the average undergraduate now earns their degree in less than 4 years. Which also reduces student debt — 57% of our undergraduates graduated last year with no student-loan debt.

• Thanks to the generous support of our alumni, we are able to guarantee – for the first time in our history – that every WI student who can qualify for admission and whose family makes less than the state’s median income will receive funding to cover tuition and fees for 4 years. One in 5 WI freshmen is now covered by the program we call Bucky’s Tuition Promise.

• And we continue to be a hot school for new students. In February, we received 54,000 applications for about 7,500 spots in the freshman class – a new record.

• I know that many of you take every opportunity to talk about the wonderful things that happen on this campus and I want to thank you for inspiring talented students to come to us.

We also continue to be a research powerhouse – one of the nation’s top 10.

• UW researchers have made headlines and brought home prestigious awards over the past year for their work in many different fields – but of course a main focus has been COVID. Our researchers are:

• • Developing better treatments for people who are hospitalized
  • Working to understand new strains of the virus
  • Designing systems for equitable vaccine distribution
  • And studying the effect of COVID on communities of color

• We invest about $1.3b a year in cutting-edge science that’s saving lives and improving the world. Those aren’t state tax dollars; they’re federal dollars and private grants we bring into Wisconsin every year.

• Most of those dollars stay here in Wisconsin. We just released a new study that shows our economic impact in this state is $30b a year.  $30 billion – that’s about 10% of the state’s GDP ($306B)

There are also welcome signs that we are getting back to normal:

• The Marching Band has started practicing again – albeit with special precautions.

• And we are very excited to hold an in-person commencement at Camp Randall next month. It will be for graduates only – parents and friends will watch online – but it’s great to be able to send this year’s seniors off with a big celebration

And of course no highlights reel would be complete without a mention of Badger athletics.  Despite all of the disruptions of COVID, our teams gave us a lot to cheer about – including back-to-back national championships for Badger Women’s Hockey.   I hope you got to see the final – that’s one game we’ll be talking about for years to come.

And I know you all heard that Barry Alvarez announced his retirement last week.  Replacing him will be a big job, and an important one.

It feels great to be able to plan for a much more normal fall semester.

The Governor has put forth a very strong budget for the UW System. It’s a near-certainty that the legislature will reduce many of his spending proposals.  But I’m cautiously optimistic we won’t be looking at budget cuts.  WI is in a better financial position than many states, so we hope to end up with some increase – the question is how much.

3 key messages

We want legislators to know 3 things:

1. An investment in UW is an investment in the entire state.

2. There are provisions we’re asking for that don’t cost the state anything, and will help us to manage our finances more efficiently.

3. The two facilities we’re asking the state to help us build will replace seriously deteriorated campus buildings and would help us expand the state’s talent pool and deepen our work with WI industry.

I’ll go through these one by one.

Key Message #1 – An Investment in UW is an Investment in WI

The Governor’s budget proposal recommends $190m in new state funding for the UW System – of which UW-Madison would get a portion.

While we deeply appreciate the budget that the Governor has put forth, we have heard that the legislature intends to start from scratch with its own budget.  Given this, it’s best to focus less on whose budget we’re supporting and more on a simple message that investing in the state’s flagship university is a great bipartisan choice for the state.

New state dollars are critical for 2 key reasons:

First, we are dealing with the worst budget disaster we’ve ever seen – we project a loss of $320m, a combination of lost revenues + COVID expenses.   That includes $50 m that the state took back from us during this past year as a budget lapse.

Fortunately, we went into 2020 in a strong financial position, so we’ve been able to divert dollars from the central campus to cover pandemic-related expenses, and we’ve received some federal relief funds.  But that hasn’t been enough to offset our losses.

We’ve mandated a year of monthly employee furlough days – that means our employees have all taken a pay cut of between 2 ½  and 4 ½ percent.  We’ve also passed budget cuts down to all units.

We need to recover from this year.  If we’re going to maintain our excellence, we need the state’s help.

Second, additional state investment will allow us to put additional dollars into education, particularly in areas where WI businesses have an urgent need.

• We want to expand our offerings in high demand programs, from computer science and data analytics to business and engineering.   To do this, we have to grow faculty strength in these and other growing fields

• We need to expand student services in tutoring, academic/career advising, mental health services.

• And we want to expand our work with farmers and producers around the state through the Division of Extension and other outreach programs.

Key Message #2 – Help us to Improve Financial Management

We also want to advocate for two provisions that don’t cost the state anything, and would allow the university to manage our finances better:

• The first would allow us to borrow money for short-term operational purposes, something every other flagship university in the country can do and which is critical in a crisis.

• Example: Athletics has lost $50m.  A loan from the campus would allow them to maintain a full staff so they’re ready to go when in-person events return.

• The second provision would allow us to better manage our cash balances. Right now state law basically requires that we hold cash under the mattress; we can’t invest it in ways that earn interest.   We are asking to be allowed to put some portion of our cash balances into safe, medium-term investments that earn a little return. This is  $10m-$20m a year to us.

The governor has included both of these provisions in his proposed budget and we want to ask the state legislature to be sure to include them in the final budget.

Key Message #3 – Investing in Two New Facilities Will Pay Dividends

The Governor’s capital budget is also very good for us.  It includes funding for two new academic buildings we’re trying to get built.  In both cases we are committed to raising about 1/3 – 1/2 (Engineering over the 2 phases will be ½) of the cost of these buildings through private philanthropy and asking the state to pay the remaining cost.

• An Engineering building that would allow us to substantially increase enrollment and give us new space for hands-on teaching and research – including research projects with partners from WI industry.

• And a new Letters & Science building that is part of series of projects to allow us to move out of our crumbling Humanities building.  As we’ve expanded our undergraduate class, we need more classrooms and modern classrooms that allow the use of modern technologies.  This building is necessary for us to provide strong classroom experiences to our students.

We’ll show you videos in a few minutes explaining more about both buildings.

I want to thank the students and alumni from Engineering and L&S who have been working with us to promote these projects.

To reiterate:  there are three key points we need to make to the legislature:

• One: Investing in UW, as the Governor has proposed, will help the entire state.

• Two: Approve the two financial provisions that will cost the state nothing.

• Three: Provide funding for our two major facilities projects.

We’re just at the beginning of the budget process – the legislature will likely finish its work in June or July and then the budget goes back to the Governor.

Conclusion

These talking points are half the story.  The other half is up to you.

Because the best way to advocate for UW-Madison is not by telling our story, but by telling yours.

I hope you’ll share with your legislator or his/her staff not only our three-point message, but your own story about the impact of UW on your life, your family, and your community.

Crystal Potts will give you some tips on how to do this most effectively at the end of our session today.

Thank you for joining us, and for all that you do for our great public university.  Good luck in your meetings.  And On, Wisconsin!