Report from USM Chancellor Jay A. Perman to USM Board of Regents on April 16
Baltimore, Md. (April 16, 2021) – Thank you, Chair Gooden. I want to start by commending our Regents Faculty Award winners. Faculty excellence and dedication took on new meaning this past year, and I look forward to celebrating our honorees in person when circumstances allow.
Let me also thank everyone who presented on Student Activism and Building Trust. Of course, it’s an important and timely discussion.
There’s a lot to get through today, so I hope you’ll read my full report on the USM website.
LEGISLATIVE SESSION
I’ll begin with the legislative session that just ended. It was a busy session for the System and for our universities, so I’ll talk about just a couple of items. The governor’s operating budget proposal for the USM of $1.4 billion was passed by the General Assembly, and we’re grateful for the funding at a time when budgets are so significantly strained.
I do have further good news on the operating budget. The governor submitted a supplemental budget proposal that was also passed by the legislature—one that will provide more than $23 million for our university-based public health and health professions programs. The money will help us expand the state’s health care workforce, enlarging programs educating nurses, pharmacists, physicians, physician assistants, public health professionals, and more.
This pandemic has underscored the vital role the USM plays in safeguarding the health of Maryland citizens. I thank the governor and the General Assembly for supporting this incredibly important work.
We also received significant capital funding for institutions across the System—dollars critical to building, improving, and maintaining campus facilities that advance our education, research, and service missions. Again, we’re grateful.
There’s just one specific bill I’d like to comment on, and that’s HB1/SB1, the historic agreement providing $577 million over 10 years for Maryland’s historically Black institutions. With this bill, we’ve taken a giant step toward funding equity between the state’s HBCUs and its traditionally white institutions. It positions Coppin, Bowie, and UMES for even greater growth and prominence.
And, of course, that means it strengthens not only these universities; it strengthens the System, too. It strengthens the state. It’s a landmark agreement—and a necessary one.
As I said, it was an incredibly busy session, and I thank our government relations team—led by Vice Chancellor Patrick Hogan—and colleagues across the System who worked around the clock to shape a legislative agenda that moves us forward.
ON-CAMPUS VACCINE DISTRIBUTION
Before highlighting news from our universities, I want to address a few COVID-related issues. As you know—even as more of us get vaccinated—we’re seeing an uptick in COVID cases. It’s a reminder that we’re not out of the woods: This pandemic is still dangerous and still deadly.
That said, we do have some very good news. We’ve seen the flow of vaccines accelerate across the state, with more mass vaccination sites, more pharmacy providers, and now an effort to ramp up mobile distribution sites. Clearly, we need every dose we can get, given that Gov. Hogan has opened up vaccine eligibility to all adult Marylanders.
The resolution of vaccine bottlenecks has benefited our campuses as well. We’re partnering with the Maryland Department of Health and the Maryland Higher Education Commission to allow our universities to register as vaccine providers. This means that university health centers are able to vaccinate the students currently on campus for the spring semester, along with faculty and staff. And if a university doesn’t have adequate personnel or capability to administer the doses, it can partner with another distributor—a nearby pharmacy, the local health department—to provide on-campus vaccination.
Securing this authority to distribute vaccines was a fast-moving effort, given that we’d like to give students the opportunity to get vaccinated before heading home for the summer. And this isn’t an insignificant number of students we’re talking about. Right now, we have about 15,000 students on campus—either in residence halls or public-private housing arrangements. Several thousand of these students have already been vaccinated.
I know many of them are grateful for the chance to get a vaccine from someone they know and trust, in a setting that’s familiar to them. At the same time, I know that—this week especially—there’s some anxiety around vaccination. Maryland has paused use of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, following the announcement that the FDA and the CDC would examine six incidents nationwide of post-vaccination blood clots.
This pause has had little impact on most of our universities, given that most are using the Moderna or Pfizer vaccine. Of course, I know all of us are following the J+J development closely, and are hoping for more data soon from the investigating agencies.
I well understand that this pause could have a chilling effect on mandating vaccines for university students across the U.S. I’ll have more to say about mandatory vaccination later in this meeting.
GETTING BACK TO “NORMAL”
I will say this right now, though: Widespread vaccination is how we’ll have a fall semester that resembles our pre-pandemic “normal.” Widespread vaccination is the way to bring back more students for on-campus instruction and activities. Widespread vaccination is the way to rekindle that vibrant energy—that sense of connection and community—that I know our students are missing.
The University System wants to get back to normal. Our universities want to get back to normal. Most of all, our students want a normal college experience.
Vaccination is a central piece of that. But, at the same time, it’s not our entire strategy. We’ll be following public health guidelines on masks and other prevention protocols. We’ll continue symptom monitoring and, yes, testing—though I imagine not with the frequency of this spring. We’ll follow guidance on isolation and quarantine. And we’ll continue to rely on our own in-house experts—together with advice from our health department colleagues—to shape and refine our fall strategy.
More than a year into this crisis, we have an infrastructure in place—at the System and university levels—that allows fast dissemination of best practices; that allows rapid and collaborative decision-making; that allows consistency, but still respects the uniqueness of each of our institutions.
RETURN TO CAMPUS: FALL 2021
And so I’ve stood up a COVID Guidance Workgroup similar to the one we convened last year. It’s coordinated by senior vice chancellor Jo Boughman and our resident epidemiology and public health expert Dr. Kate Tracy.
Just like last year, System and university reps are coming together to develop guidance that, collectively, we can point to as individual campus plans take shape. They’re weighing in on vaccination, testing, contact tracing, isolation and quarantine, and continued public health interventions. They’re sharing guidance on how to get our campus facilities ready for fall; what infrastructure and policies we’ll need should we have to pivot once again to remote learning; what will be permitted when it comes to, for example, employee business travel and study-abroad programs; what the impact will be on our international students.
I thank the group for its ongoing work, and I look forward to keeping the board updated on our fall plans.
Turning now to our universities, there’s been no shortage of good news.
QUALITY AND IMPACT
We’ve talked a lot this year about the importance of civic education and democratic engagement. Well, five System universities are among 200 nationwide to be named a Voter-Friendly Campus by the Fair Elections Center’s Campus Vote Project: UMES, Frostburg, UB, Towson, and UMBC.
VIQTORY is a network serving military personnel who are transitioning to civilian life. It’s given four of our universities its Military-Friendly Schools rating: UMES, Salisbury, Bowie State, and—for the 10th consecutive year—Frostburg State University.
Intelligent.com awarded Coppin State two U.S. Top 40 program rankings: for its master’s in adult and continuing education & its program in business management.
UMBC broke the Top 100 public institutions for federal research expenditures, as reported in the NSF’s annual R&D survey.
In the latest U.S. News and World Report graduate school rankings, College Park had 25 Top 20 programs, including seven in the Top 5. At UMB, every school was either in the Top 20, or had programs in the Top 20, including five Top 10 rankings. But I want to emphasize here that literally every eligible USM institution was recognized among the U.S. News rankings.
ACADEMIC PROGRAMS AND CAMPUS FACILITIES
Let me switch gears to our expanding programs and our growing footprint.
Salisbury and UMES have renewed an innovative partnership allowing students to earn two degrees—physics and engineering—in only 4½ years.
Sustaining its 70-year mission to educate U.S. military personnel serving overseas, UMGC has opened its 51st permanent location in Europe—at Spain’s Morón Air Force Base.
UMB’s School of Nursing inked two more dual-admission agreements with Maryland community colleges. This is especially notable, because—with these agreements—the school now has a formal partnership with every community college in Maryland that has a nursing program, meaning students across the state have a streamlined pathway to a four-year nursing degree.
At the USM at Southern Maryland, progress continues on the $86 million technology facility opening this fall. The building will transform education for students in Southern Maryland. It’ll advance cutting-edge research in unmanned autonomous systems. And it will stimulate economic growth across the region.
PARTNERSHIPS, PHILANTHROPY AND ECONOMIC IMPACT
Let’s look at our success in entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and economic development.
College Park spinoff company IonQ—headquartered in the university’s Discovery District—made history last month, when it became the first-ever quantum computer hardware and software company to go public, doing so with a $2 billion valuation. It strengthens Maryland’s standing as a globally known hub for quantum computing.
UMES and biotech firm IES Life Sciences have developed a first-of-its-kind test that predicts severity of COVID symptoms, so that resources stretched thin by the pandemic can be focused on the patients who need them the most.
Energy data startup Dynamhex formed by UB assistant professor Sanwar Sunny, became the USM Momentum Fund’s 20th investment. The company interprets complex energy consumption and carbon footprint data for corporations, communities, and municipal agencies—and just completed a $1.5 million seed round.
An incredible $9 million gift from Brin Family Foundation will help College Park reimagine performing arts education—funding research, scholarships, new teaching positions, classroom and studio renovations, and instructional technology.
A $5 million gift from biotech entrepreneurs Marco and Debbie Chacón establishes the Chacón Center for Immigrant Justice at UMB’s Carey School of Law. The center focuses on issues of asylum and the intersection of criminal and immigrant law, training future lawyers to tackle this frontier of human and civil rights.
The University of Baltimore received a $5 million gift from real estate developer Samuel Rose to create a new scholarship fund. It’s the largest cash gift from a single donor in UB’s history, and is meant to help undergraduates struggling to afford tuition—just like Mr. Rose struggled when he was a young student.
INDIVIDUAL EXCELLENCE
Our excellence shines brightest in the people and teams who call the USM “home.”
At UB, assistant professors Sarah Federman and Al Gourrier, both from the School of Public and International Affairs, have been accepted to the Fulbright Specialist Program for a tenure of four years.
UMCES Assistant Professor Xin Zhang won an NSF CAREER Award to lead a five-year research program supporting sustainable nitrogen use and effective ecosystem management in the Chesapeake Bay and in estuaries around the world.
Bowie’s ROTC program won the U.S. Army Cadet Command’s MacArthur Award, which signifies that the program is one of the best in the nation.
Proving UMBC’s impressive leadership in cybersecurity, the school’s Cyber Dawgs team won the Mid-Atlantic Collegiate Cyber Defense Competition. The team is off to the national championship later this month—and we’ll be waiting on the results.
College Park student Pavan Ravindra is one of only 17 students nationwide awarded a 2021 Winston Churchill Scholarship, funding his master’s degree studies next year at the University of Cambridge.
The Universities at Shady Grove is positioning itself as a leader in virtual engagement—with industry roundtables, podcasts, and—just now—a virtual tour designed and developed by USG’s Student Ambassadors.
The Maryland Daily Record named its Top 100 Women, among them Christy Weer from Salisbury University, Charlotte Wood from Coppin State, and three faculty members from UMB: Tracey Bale, Kimberly Lumpkins, and Jill RachBeisel. Towson’s president Kim Schatzel, made the Top 100 Women list for a third time, meaning she was inducted into the Circle of Excellence, the publication’s highest honor. President Schatzel also made the paper’s Power 100 list, joining fellow presidents Darryll Pines, Freeman Hrabowski, and Bruce Jarrell.
And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that our own board chair, Linda Gooden, was inducted into the Baltimore Sun’s Business and Civic Hall of Fame.
COMMUNITY OUTREACH AND SERVICE
Of course—as much as anything else—it’s service that animates the University System and draws us closer to our communities.
UMBC has launched a Biotech Boot Camp at USG to train workers displaced by COVID. They get four weeks of intensive training in basic techniques, qualifying them for entry-level biotech jobs.
Coppin has set up a COVID-19 call center to help vulnerable neighbors in Baltimore schedule vaccination appointments.
The TU Tutors initiative out of Towson’s College of Education is providing free, online tutoring to 500-plus Maryland students—elementary through high school.
Next Saturday, Frostburg State will host its annual Beautify the ’Burg event, joining with neighbors in revitalization projects ahead of the region’s tourism season.
The USM at Hagerstown engaged its community in a virtual open house—with faculty, staff, and administrators answering questions and outlining their plans for fall.
And finally, in a year that saw so many people struggling financially, the Maryland Charity Campaign showed how big the USM’s heart really is. The USM Office, the USM Foundation, and seven of our 12 institutions exceeded their giving goals. UB, Salisbury, and the USM Office received special awards for excellence. And UMBC was honored as the top contributor for the entire statewide campaign—recording pledges of nearly $250,000. I am sincerely awed by the generosity of this University System, and I thank everyone who took part.
Madame Chair, this concludes my report.
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Contact: Mike Lurie
Phone: 301.445.2719
Email: mlurie@usmd.edu
