ZAUM

Chancellor, preparing to head West, is proud of overhauling UT System.

By Ralph K.M. Haurwitz
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, April 20, 2008

Mark Yudof promises to arrive “bright and early, or at least one or the other,” when he begins his new job as president of the University of California system June 16. He’s been chancellor of the University of Texas System since August 2002.

The 63-year-old Yudof reflected on his current position and looked ahead to his new one during an interview at his wood-paneled office in O. Henry Hall in downtown Austin recently. Here is an edited account:

 

What would you mark down as the biggest disappointment?

I would say there are two things I really wanted to get done. I wouldn’t say they are 100 percent disappointments. But I look at budgets of other universities around the country, including California, and those institutions are better supported than our institutions.

 

Better supported by the state?

Yes. But it’s most salient at UT-Austin, which is trying to compete with Berkeley and Michigan and Virginia and all sorts of places. We had a good legislative session last time mostly, not entirely. I wish we could persuade the Legislature to invest more in higher education. The second thing is we still do not have a long-term strategic plan for higher education in the state. You need to have a vision, and you need to have a plan, and you need to put the dollars into it.

 

Which schools in Texas might have a shot at top-tier status, and what would it take to lift them to the status of UT-Austin and Texas A&M University?

We have four regional institutions — UT-Dallas, UT-Arlington, UT-San Antonio, UT-El Paso — and each of them has particular advantages and some disadvantages. Houston is one of America’s largest metropolitan areas. It has an institution, the University of Houston, which is just under $100 million in research funding. If the Houston community could get behind that institution … The other one is Texas Tech, which has a substantial research profile and a medical school.

rhaurwitz@statesman.com; 445-3604