Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, January 21, 1995 TAG: 9501230034
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ALLISON BLAKE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
The action came two weeks after the school's board of visitors bowed to Gov. George Allen and pulled the plug on five years' and $2.2 million worth of planning for the new college. Marye, D-Shawsville, asked for full restoration of $2 million in operating funds cut in the Allen budget.
``I don't like to be critical of the board of visitors; I respect their decision. I do think it was a hasty decision,'' said Marye, who believes the new college ``would put Radford on the map as a progressive university.''
Bernard Wampler, the rector, or chairman, of Radford's board, said he did not know why Marye filed his amendment.
But Marye did so on the same day the university filed its own plans to salvage pieces of the new college. Sen. Malfourd ``Bo'' Trumbo, R-Fincastle, who replaced Marye as Radford's senator in the 1991 redistricting, filed a package worth nearly $1.4 million to add computers and other high-tech communications to Radford's health and business curricula. These tools, crucial to the high-tech new college that was to open next fall, would help ``internationalize'' Radford's health and business curricula.
The plan, said Secretary of Education Beverly Sgro, ``does correspond very well with the kinds of things we would hope an institution would do, and enhances the existing curriculum.''
But she stopped short of giving the Trumbo plan her total support, saying the program will have to be financed from money left over from the keystone of Allen's agenda: a $2.1 billion tax cut.
The $1.4 million plan would help Radford absorb its anticipated 2,000-student share of the baby boomlet that the new college would have taken. The program would feature interactive media designed by faculty, and the College of Business and Economics would hold workshops, conferences and training programs to increase business opportunities in Southwest Virginia.
The New College of Global Studies featured a separate program from Radford University proper. With a focus on foreign languages, the students would study and work abroad, and take classes through interactive video or computer with instructors in other countries.
When the board voted unanimously to drop the new college, ``we were trying to keep the best of it and trying to secure funds from the state to help implement this program into the core of education at Radford University,'' Wampler said.
``We have been clearly told by the [state] Department of Education and by Governor Allen's staff that the stand-alone global college would be vetoed,'' Wampler said.
Trumbo also said he understood ``that that the governor's office would flat-out veto [the new college] if it came back as originally instituted.''
Allen spokesman Ken Stroupe said the governor had made no decisions on what to do about any of the myriad budget amendments filed before Friday's deadline. But he pointed to the board's vote and a faculty-authored commentary opposing the college in the Roanoke Times & World-News as ``a strong indication'' of a lack of support for the college.
Marye said he will support the Trumbo amendment if it prevails. But he also said the new college deserves a second look - and that its demise came as ``a bombshell.''
``Here is a school that at the present time is searching for a president,'' he said. ``This thing couldn't have happened at a worse time.''
Radford has just chosen two finalists in its search for a president.
Marye also said he doesn't know what other damage already may have been done to the new college. About five students who had been accepted on early decision for the 50-member pilot class next fall have been told that the college is dead. About 14 full-time people work for the new college; the $1.4 million plan would employ 16, although whether the 14 present employees would be among that number remains to be seen.
``A lot of money has gone down the drain already in this thing,'' Marye said. ``It's an innovative idea whose time has come. I'm not an educator, but up until just recently, it's been acclaimed as being an innovative approach to education in the future.''
Marye said his action had nothing to do with his daughter's employment at the school. Charlotte Hawes, who has worked in public and government relations for years, earns $49,500 annually as director of college relations and development for the new college. The job would end July 1, when money for the school runs out.
``I didn't get her the job,'' Marye said. ``She got the job on her own.
``There aren't many jobs around home that are available in her line of work. The truth of the matter is, it would probably hurt her more than it will help her, because people will look and say, `Well, it's going to look bad.'''
Said Hawes: ``Dad's going to do what he's going to do. Frankly, if anything, he's kind of bent over backwards not to show favoritism for an organization that I've worked for.''
She added that, as a university employee, she supports the board's stance.
Meredith Strohm, provost of the new college, could not be reached Friday for comment on the two amendments.
Assistant Provost Valerie Watkins said only that the $1.4 million amendment seemed to be a move for the university ``to do what it said it would do'' - to internationalize the curriculum.
Keywords:
GENERAL ASSEMBLY 1995
by CNB