Portland State University and Oregon Health & Science University form formal alliance
http://www.oregonlive.com/education/index.ssf/2010/10/portland_state_university_and_1.html
Portland State University and Oregon Health & Science University are formally joining forces on research and education ventures.
While the universities are stopping short of a full merger, as some leaders have advocated, their presidents have committed to joint research, shared faculty and a new collaborative School of Public Health. The schools also will share dormitories and space in other facilities, including a new Life Sciences Building, and team up on everything from parking lot management to campus security dispatch.
PSU President Wim Wiewel described the pact as "the highest level of commitment" to finding ways the two universities can together deliver more "value to the region and state."
Dr. Joe Robertson, president of OHSU, said the collaboration will create a permanent steering committee and a lasting commitment.
"The rate of change will be modest at first," he said, "but this will have substantial impact over time."
A task force of university employees and community members studied ways the two universities could best collaborate, including the possibility of a merger, and recommended the "strategic alliance" that the presidents have adopted.
Though opinions vary among professors, PSU faculty are generally warm to a stronger partnership between the two institutions, said Sherril Gelmon, a public health professor who represented the PSU Faculty Senate on the task force.
"There is a fair level of excitement about the opportunities this could present," she said. "It is almost unlimited what we might potentially do together. "
The PSU-OHSU pact does not need legislative approval, but it will be affected by a number of proposals headed for the Legislature early next year to restructure higher education in Oregon.
Robertson and Wiewel, for example, want to see a more independent PSU freed from the restrictions of its state agency status – a change the state Board of Higher Education is proposing for all seven campuses in the Oregon University System.
The University of Oregon also wants its own governing board and about $800 million in state bond matching money so that it can use its endowment to finance its operations. An interim legislative work group is also looking at bringing the state's 17 community colleges under the authority of the state Board of Higher Education.
A public hearing on the PSU-OHSU partnership is scheduled for 2 p.m. Tuesday in Room 327 of PSU's Smith Memorial Student Union.
The alliance brings together two of Oregon's largest research universities, which together enroll about 32,000 students and employ 16,300 workers. OHSU, with its schools of medicine, nursing, dentistry, pharmacy and science and engineering shares some common ground with PSU's programs and research in engineering, science, health and sustainable practices.
Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland, has long advocated the two institutions merge, arguing it is the only way the state can create a major, top-ranked university in Portland. Many other prosperous metropolitan areas, such as Boston, San Diego and Seattle, draw on the economic power of comprehensive universities with academic health centers.
The economic research firm Tripp Umbach reported this summer that the University of Washington has a $9.1 billion economic impact on the greater Seattle area, producing 28,000 direct jobs and 42,000 indirect jobs.
But Wiewel and Robertson said moves toward a merger would be expensive and counterproductive at a time when the state is facing more than a $3 billion shortfall in the 2011-13 state budget. Just merging the universities' information technologies and developing common salary and benefit packages would be costly, Wiewel said.
A closer partnership accomplishes many of the benefits of a merger "at a fraction of the costs," Robertson said, "in a fraction of the time."
OHSU, for example, could develop its own school of public health, but the school will be better by including the strong community health program that PSU has developed, Robertson said.
Greenlick first proposed the PSU-OHSU merger in a 2005 bill and again in the 2009 Legislature. While neither passed, the bills led to a 2007 study that concluded a merger would be difficult and yield no taxpayer savings. He recommends that PSU break from the Oregon University System and operate as a public corporation under the same governing board as OHSU. The board could decide over the next decade whether to merge the two universities, he said.
Greenlick said his proposal, which he plans to introduce in the 2011 Legislature, would foster the kind of alliance the task force recommended.
"Doing what I'm talking about," he said, "would allow them to do what they are talking about."
http://www.oregonlive.com/education/index.ssf/2010/10/portland_state_university_and_1.html
Portland State University and Oregon Health & Science University are formally joining forces on research and education ventures.
While the universities are stopping short of a full merger, as some leaders have advocated, their presidents have committed to joint research, shared faculty and a new collaborative School of Public Health. The schools also will share dormitories and space in other facilities, including a new Life Sciences Building, and team up on everything from parking lot management to campus security dispatch.
PSU President Wim Wiewel described the pact as "the highest level of commitment" to finding ways the two universities can together deliver more "value to the region and state."
Dr. Joe Robertson, president of OHSU, said the collaboration will create a permanent steering committee and a lasting commitment.
"The rate of change will be modest at first," he said, "but this will have substantial impact over time."
A task force of university employees and community members studied ways the two universities could best collaborate, including the possibility of a merger, and recommended the "strategic alliance" that the presidents have adopted.
Though opinions vary among professors, PSU faculty are generally warm to a stronger partnership between the two institutions, said Sherril Gelmon, a public health professor who represented the PSU Faculty Senate on the task force.
"There is a fair level of excitement about the opportunities this could present," she said. "It is almost unlimited what we might potentially do together. "
The PSU-OHSU pact does not need legislative approval, but it will be affected by a number of proposals headed for the Legislature early next year to restructure higher education in Oregon.
Robertson and Wiewel, for example, want to see a more independent PSU freed from the restrictions of its state agency status – a change the state Board of Higher Education is proposing for all seven campuses in the Oregon University System.
The University of Oregon also wants its own governing board and about $800 million in state bond matching money so that it can use its endowment to finance its operations. An interim legislative work group is also looking at bringing the state's 17 community colleges under the authority of the state Board of Higher Education.
A public hearing on the PSU-OHSU partnership is scheduled for 2 p.m. Tuesday in Room 327 of PSU's Smith Memorial Student Union.
The alliance brings together two of Oregon's largest research universities, which together enroll about 32,000 students and employ 16,300 workers. OHSU, with its schools of medicine, nursing, dentistry, pharmacy and science and engineering shares some common ground with PSU's programs and research in engineering, science, health and sustainable practices.
Rep. Mitch Greenlick, D-Portland, has long advocated the two institutions merge, arguing it is the only way the state can create a major, top-ranked university in Portland. Many other prosperous metropolitan areas, such as Boston, San Diego and Seattle, draw on the economic power of comprehensive universities with academic health centers.
The economic research firm Tripp Umbach reported this summer that the University of Washington has a $9.1 billion economic impact on the greater Seattle area, producing 28,000 direct jobs and 42,000 indirect jobs.
But Wiewel and Robertson said moves toward a merger would be expensive and counterproductive at a time when the state is facing more than a $3 billion shortfall in the 2011-13 state budget. Just merging the universities' information technologies and developing common salary and benefit packages would be costly, Wiewel said.
A closer partnership accomplishes many of the benefits of a merger "at a fraction of the costs," Robertson said, "in a fraction of the time."
OHSU, for example, could develop its own school of public health, but the school will be better by including the strong community health program that PSU has developed, Robertson said.
Greenlick first proposed the PSU-OHSU merger in a 2005 bill and again in the 2009 Legislature. While neither passed, the bills led to a 2007 study that concluded a merger would be difficult and yield no taxpayer savings. He recommends that PSU break from the Oregon University System and operate as a public corporation under the same governing board as OHSU. The board could decide over the next decade whether to merge the two universities, he said.
Greenlick said his proposal, which he plans to introduce in the 2011 Legislature, would foster the kind of alliance the task force recommended.
"Doing what I'm talking about," he said, "would allow them to do what they are talking about."
