IUP President Michael Driscoll addressed several issues at his mid-semester briefing on Monday.
One of the topics that was brought up was the recent issue of a student being thrown out of class. Earlier this year, Lake Ingle, a religious studies senior, was thrown out of a class for allegedly “disrespectful” classroom behavior and would have been allowed back in if he had made verbal and written apologies to the class and the professor, Dr. Alison Downie, and would have to sit and listen as Downie and the students told him how his remarks and actions made them feel without him being allowed to respond. He refused to do so, and a hearing of IUP’s Academic Integrity Board was started. President Driscoll stepped in to suspend the hearing indefinitely in March.
Yesterday, Driscoll did not offer any further details on the situation itself, but he did say that his actions did receive complaints and compliments. He did talk with the university senate earlier this month and said that he felt that in this divided time, the policy framework at IUP is “not up to the task.” He added that he will ask the University Senate to work with the administration to review the policies currently in place, and set up regular reviews of those policies.
Another topic covered by Driscoll was student enrollment.
Driscoll said that it looks like for now, new undergraduate and transfer student deposits are holding steady despite declining high school graduate population figures in IUP’s primary markets. Drsicoll also mentioned they are working hard on incoming students who reside outside of the state. Driscoll mentioned an effort that got approval earlier this year from the State System Board of Governors to help out-of-state students. While the plan is in its early phases, it is going well from a university standpoint.
He added that the graduate student enrollment numbers are also seeing a bit of an increase.
Driscoll also addressed the budget, and said that there was a lot of hard work put into the budget process, and said that while they’ve been in a stronger position than they have been in the last few years, they still have a way to go. Driscoll said that they are not in danger of going broke anytime soon. In prior years, he said it was all about cost, and now it’s about getting to the proper size that IUP can be comfortable in and have the students utilize resources properly.
You can find Driscoll’s complete speech at https://www.iup.edu/news-item.aspx?id=252902
