>>Thank you all for being here.
My name is Al Willsey.
I work as a research assistant in the Philosophy Department, and that's where I'm a third year
doctoral student.
I serve as the treasurer of the Graduate Professional Council, which is the student government for
more than 7,000 graduate and professional students on campus.
The president of GPC wishes he could be here today but he's at home on bed rest for a minor
injury.
I keep trying to tell him that exercise is dangerous.
So it's my pleasure to welcome you all here today.
I first came to Mizzou from Kansas City in 2011 as an undergraduate pursuing mathematics.
As part of my STEM degree, I was required, though I prefer to interpret that as encouraged,
to take humanities courses in the College of Arts and Science.
It was this encouragement that led me to take philosophy classes from logic to philosophy
of mind.
This selection of courses inspired me to take an extra academic year of coursework just
to get an extra degree, one in philosophy.
And now I'm continuing along in that field at the graduate level.
I'm grateful to Mizzou that there is so much opportunity present on campus that we'd never
expect.
And I've been able to follow that opportunity into a new career path.
I'm also grateful that Mizzou has been able to offer me a tuition waiver and stipend to
keep me around.
I would not have been able to pursue my graduate degree at this institution nor serve my fellow
students without the financial package offered to me.
As treasurer of the graduate professional student government, I've had the opportunity
on a couple of occasions to speak with Chancellor Cartwright in person.
The GPC leadership has seen the Chancellor's dedication to furthering students success.
What has been of particular importance to me is the Chancellor's dedication to pursuing
genuine innovation in how we train, utilize and place our graduate professional students.
As Missouri's only public R1 AAU university, finding dynamic and innovative ways to make
graduate professional students more central to Missouri's sense of identity offers significant
opportunity just waiting to be capitalized on.
As a graduate student leader, I look forward to working with the Chancellor in the future.
But without further ado, I'm pleased to introduce the man himself, Chancellor Alexander Cartwright.
[ Applause ]
>> Thank you Al for that introduction, and thanks to all of you for being here today,
both in the auditorium and listening online.
Al spoke of many of the things that make Mizzou a great institution - and his experience is
an example of the opportunities provided to both graduate and undergraduate students as
part of a public research institution.
By working with our faculty, students at Mizzou have a unique opportunity to gain an outstanding
education, whether they are working on a philosophy doctorate, an M.D. degree, an engineering
degree, or any other degree at MU.
In November, after my first 100 days at Mizzou, I shared with you our renewed commitment to
supporting student success.
Today, after a little more than 200 days here, I want to focus on some of the ways Mizzou
makes a positive impact on the state, the nation and the world.
And, I want to share with you how we will increase this positive impact through our
research, our creative activities and through our ability to drive economic development.
There are many things that make a great institution like Mizzou exceptional.
We are a public institution, an AAU institution - one of only 32 publics in the country.
We are classified as a Carnegie 1 research institution, the highest level.
We are a land-grant campus that is accessible to the people of the state, a campus that
extends its knowledge out to the people through Extension.
We are a Midwestern institution, with strong Midwestern values, and a member of the SEC.
All of these things help define who we are, and what we are able to do for our state.
But what really makes us exceptional are our people.
It is our students, and it is our faculty and staff who contribute to our mission of
teaching, research, creative activities, service and economic development
in their work every day.
And we have the tremendous support of our alumni, our supporters and our friends across
the state, nation and world.
Today, we are going to explore the areas of research, creative activities, and economic
development.
I'll share some successes, and also share my thoughts on where we plan to go in each
of these areas.
And what I want to show, as we go through each these areas, is the significant impact
Mizzou has on society today, and how we can have an even greater impact in the future.
That impact begins with the quality and breadth of the scholarship of our faculty.
They are shaping views on economics, politics and society.
They enrich our lives through the arts and humanities.
They are able to develop solutions to the world's grand challenges - food, water, health,
and others.
And they engage our community - both on and off campus.
Our faculty truly are thought leaders.
They have received more than 400 major national and international awards.
Six are National Academy of Inventors members and six are National Academy of Sciences members.
And they are prolific in publishing - more than 500 books in the last ten years.
And 600 conference proceedings in the last three years.
And more than 7,000 articles published during the last three years, which are cited numerous
times by other researchers in their field.
And there's even more I can brag about - and I do believe we need to brag more about ourselves.
Our faculty have helped Mizzou achieve national and global recognition.
We're ranked number 1 in the world in the area of animal reproductive physiology.
We're competitively ranked in accounting, law, journalism, business marketing, nursing,
Mizzou Online, and many other areas.
But the impact we have on society doesn't end with the faculty.
Consider what our students contribute - nine Fulbright grants in 2017.
Mizzou juniors selected as prestigious Truman scholars nationally each of the past three
years for their commitment to public service.
Nearly 100 students interning in state and federal government offices each year.
Our students served more than 1.7 million hours in the community last year.
And 500 undergraduate students participated in research.
You can see some of these students and their work in the atrium after this talk.
Now, we just went through a lot of numbers.
And I have to warn you that this talk is full of numbers.
I didn't just show you these numbers to brag, although bragging about Mizzou is an important
part of my job.
I don't expect you to remember all of these numbers but I use these numbers to quantify
the significant impact of our faculty and students at Mizzou, across the state and around
the world.
Our impact is amplified by the support of our tremendous supporters - many of whom are
our alums.
Our donor supported signature centers of excellence enable our internationally recognized scholars
to impact the world.
These centers include the Kinder Institute, the Reynolds Journalism Institute, the Thompson
Center, the Novak Leadership institute and the Murray Center for Documentary Journalism,
among others.
The impact of Mizzou is the result of the outstanding work of our faculty, students
and staff.
I would like to highlight some of the individual examples of their incredible contributions.
Autism is a spectrum of closely related symptoms involving behavioral, social and cognitive
deficits.
Early detection is key to producing the best outcomes.
At Mizzou, a multi-disciplinary team including Chi-Ren Shyu, in the College of Engineering,
created a new method to identify several target genes for autism.
Using advanced computational techniques as well as the capabilities of the National Science
Foundation (NSF)-funded big data center at Mizzou, Shyu and his team were able to identify
193 new candidate genes.
Judith Miles, professor emerita of child health-genetics at the Thompson Center, says that these new
targets are ones that she and her fellow geneticists might not have considered previously.
Funding for the project was also provided by the National Institutes of Health (NIH)
as well as the Simons Foundation in New York.
The decline in wild and managed bee populations is threatening the pollination of flowers
in more than 85 percent of flowering plants and 75 percent of agricultural crops worldwide.
Widespread and effective monitoring of bee populations could lead to better management;
however, tracking bees is tricky and costly.
Candace Galen, professor of biological science in the College of Arts and Science, developed
an inexpensive acoustic listening system using data from small microphones in the field to
monitor bees in flight.
The study shows how farmers could use the technology to monitor pollination and increase
food production.
The team is even developing a smartphone app that records bee activity.
Many middle school students can be at a disadvantage when it comes to learning science, technology,
engineering and math principles.
For learners with disabilities and those from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds,
understanding these principles can be especially challenging.
To address this, Delinda van Garderen, professor and director of graduate studies in MU's Department
of Special Education; and Bill Folk, professor of biochemistry in CAFNR and the School of
Medicine, have applied understanding of these principles to improve professional development
for teachers and assess the materials they are using for instruction.
This is funded by a $1.25 million NIH grant.
Spinal muscular atrophy with respiratory distress type 1 (SMARD1) is a rare genetic condition
with a high mortality rate that develops primarily between the ages of six weeks and six months.
It targets the spinal cord and leads to atrophy of body muscles and paralysis of the diaphragm,
which is responsible for breathing.
The average life expectancy is 13 months, and it affects 200,000 people in the U.S.
Currently, there is no cure or effective treatment for this disease.
Chris Lorson, a professor of veterinary pathobiology, has spent decades studying this disorder.
Chris and his team, through funding from the NIH and the Silas Warner and Catherine Sims
Families, developed a gene replacement therapy that can be used to treat and control the
disease in the future.
Chris' research highlights the power of translational precision medicine that I will discuss later.
It is exciting to see the work we are doing on the creative side as well.
Art on the Move provides professional opportunities for students to interact with the public exhibitions,
workshops, and internships, while they're still in school.
This effort is part of the new School of Visual Studies in the College of Arts and Science,
which realigned programs in art, art history, film studies and digital storytelling.
This interdisciplinary approach has resulted in a significant number of students seeking
these majors.
In the School of Medicine, our Functional Assessment Screening Team is developing motion
analysis technology in areas such as sports medicine, physical therapy, strength and conditioning,
biomechanics and computer science to improve the health and well-being of patients - including
athletes - by identifying risk factors for injury, tracking rehabilitation outcomes and
optimizing athletic performance.
This program is housed in our newly expanded Missouri Orthopaedic Institute.
Another great example of collaboration can be seen in the iLab initiative.
The iLab is a virtual reality facility, housed in the College of Human Environmental Science's
Architectural Studies area, that enables stereoscopic 3-dimensional (3D) visualization and design
collaboration.
These collaborations involve engineering, medicine, the Thompson Center for Autism,
journalism and more.
TigerPlace is a 33-unit housing facility built by Americare Systems, Inc. in collaboration
with the MU Sinclair School of Nursing.
A high-tech independent housing facility, TigerPlace allows elderly people to age in
place through the end of life, maximizing independence and function.
It is a state-of-the-art eldercare facility where residents volunteer to participate in
research projects that help to advance care practices.
As an example, researchers at the University of Missouri have been collaborating for the
past 14 years on a project aimed at helping to prevent the nightmarish scenario of an
elderly person falling and lying injured for hours before help arrives.
"The eldertech team," as it's been nicknamed, is an interdisciplinary group of remarkable
scale, with researchers from multiple fields such as engineering, veterinary medicine,
nursing, medicine, health professions and other areas working closely together.
Marjorie Skubic, professor of electrical and computer engineering, is leading the effort
on the engineering side.
To predict falls, researchers used data collected from sensor systems at TigerPlace.
The system generates images and an alert email for nurses indicating when irregular motion
was detected.
This information could be used to assist nurses in assessing functional decline, providing
treatment and preventing falls.
As we go through these examples, you see how we have faculty who are on the cutting edge
of their fields.
They are discovering new knowledge that benefits society.
And we often say that our professors not only teach from the latest books, they write them.
These are just a few of the dozens of books that our faculty publish each year.
We also find achievements in professional divisions such as the School of Law.
Our MU Board of Advocates won the American Bar Association regional championships in
client counseling and arbitration.
Our MU Black Law Students Association have advanced to the National Frederick Douglass
Moot Court and the National Thurgood Marshall Mock Trial competitions.
We have many incredible faculty at Mizzou, and here's a great example.
MU bioengineering Professor Sheila Grant, who also serves as associate dean of research
at the College of Engineering, has been named a 2017 Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors
(NAI).
Election to NAI status is the highest professional accolade bestowed to academic inventors.
This is just one of many accolades that Dr. Grant has received during her career.
She holds seven U.S. patents related to sensors, nanomaterials and biomaterials and holds many
international patents.
Three of her technologies have been licensed.
She is the founder of three startup companies, and she has published more than 100 peer-reviewed
research articles.
When we think of research and creative activities, we often think of the faculty, along with
their staff who support the efforts.
But at Mizzou, these activities are a big part of graduate and undergraduate experiences.
Let's look at some examples of how research and creative works support our graduate and
undergraduate students.
We are able to connect research with many of our teaching activities at MU.
Whether it is in agriculture, medicine, music, history, teaching or business, hands-on experiences
based on our faculty's scholarly expertise are what make a Mizzou unique and give our
students a competitive edge, whether in the work force or in advanced studies.
Consider the example of Alexa Thein, one of many students working with Dr. Michael Marlo
and Dr. Rebecca Grollemund who are both in English and Linguistics.
Alexa was one of four undergraduates who traveled to Kenya this past summer to do linguistics
field work as they document and analyze Bantu languages, which have many dialects spoken
throughout most of the continent.
And here is Dr. Ruchi Bhattacharya and Dr. Terrell Morton, both post docs who won a 2017
Student Teaching and Learning Research Grant for their exploration of learning to think
with data in a graduate statistics course.
She is an aquatic biogeochemist and quantitative ecologist in the School of Natural Resources,
and he is a scholar in the College of Education.
During the reception after my talk, I invite you to visit the Mezzanine area just upstairs
here at Bond Life Sciences Center, where you can see displays of the work of our faculty
and students.
These displays include work in many areas - linguistics, anthropology, art, biochemistry,
mathematics, architecture - and are examples of innovative exploration taking place across
all of our schools and colleges.
Please take time to check this out and to talk with our students and faculty about their work.
I believe that one of the most powerful ways we can thrive as an institution, and increase
our external recognition as thought leaders among our AAU and Research 1 peer institutions
is by bringing people together.
In 2010, MU began investing strategically to amplify our areas of expertise through
the Mizzou Advantage program.
This program focused our research efforts in five key areas: One Health/One Medicine,
Sustainable Energy, Media of the Future, Education and Food for the Future.
You can see the leaders from each of these areas on the slide.
We have seen several outcomes from Mizzou Advantage, including the work of the Aaron
Ericsson with the MU Metagenomics Center; the Based on a True Story Conference led by
former Chancellor Brady Deaton; Bill Ma's Oscillating Pipes research that led to a new
company; Twyla Gibson's work in the digital humanities, and a Summit on universities fighting
world hunger led by Sandy Rikoon in Human Environmental Sciences.
Our Mizzou Advantage investments of $12.12 million have resulted in more than $49 million
in external support, including more than $42 million in grants and more than $4 million
in donations to support the program.
I believe we have several individuals who are part of Mizzou Advantage, along with many
of the staff, who helped with this program.
I'd like to take a moment to recognize our entire Mizzou Advantage team for their work.
Please stand up. [ Applause ]
Thank you for your contributions to this important program and for your efforts to promote the
incredible work of our faculty, staff and students.
Here we can see our research expenditure trends at MU over the past few years.
It has been a challenging environment for all research institutions during this time.
The federal government has decreased funding to some agencies which in turn reduces our
access to funding.
Moreover, real growth of research funding has stagnated.
We must all become more competitive.
This graph of our Higher Education Research and Development expenditures shows that our
research expenditures have increased slightly during this challenging time.
So while I've gone through many examples of successes and outcomes, we want to do more
Creative activities are critical to the advancement of our society.
We value the arts, music, theater, humanities and how they impact our lives.
Today I am announcing plans to launch an artist in residence program at Mizzou that will bring
exciting artists and creative thinkers here to share their expertise with our faculty,
staff and students and the public.
I'm asking the Dean of the College of Arts and Science to lead this university wide effort
and an associated showcase event.
To further explore the contributions creative arts bring to our lives, we will reimagine
the chancellor's showcase to provide dozens of examples of creativity by our students,
faculty, staff and the community.
I look forward to seeing what ideas our campus community brings forward toward this concept.
Curators' Professors hold the highest and most prestigious academic rank awarded by
the Board of Curators.
Recipients are outstanding scholars with established reputations.
We are going to set up a new Academy of Curators' Professors.
This will feature many of our best and brightest researchers.
I'm asking the Provost to take the lead in organizing them in a way that provides more
interaction with junior faculty and scholars, and enables them to share their expertise
with a broader range of our community.
John Jones, a Curators' Professors participating in this Academy, will serve as a resource
for the entire university, providing guidance and mentorship to students and junior faculty
alike.
I am committed to increasing opportunities for students and faculty to receive national
recognition awards for their excellence.
Our faculty and students are doing amazing things, and we will prioritize helping them
gain national awards of excellence, recognition and appreciation they deserve.
I am asking the Office of the Provost to have a renewed effort in nominating our students
and faculty for prestigious recognition awards.
We are announcing an effort today to explore alternative career pathways for graduate students
who choose not to enter the academy after completing their degrees.
I know that our graduate student leaders have been thinking about the "alt-ac" approach
many students take, and they have some great ideas of how we can better prepare and support
these students as they enter the workplace.
I've asked our office of Graduate Studies to work with our graduate student leadership
to further develop their concepts and to establish a much needed resource for "alt-ac" careers
for graduate students.
Today I am announcing a new goal for MU to double our external research funding in the
next five years.
Achieving this goal allows us to support our pathbreaking work that contributes so much
to society.
We have much work to do as we develop strategies to achieve this.
I ask that we all work together to achieve this goal.
This chart shows our funding totals among our peers in the AAU.
We currently have just a little over $250 million in expenditures, which puts us in
the lowest quartile.
To reach the third quartile, it would require an increase of more than $102 million.
Doubling of our external research will enable us to move into that third quartile.
To be able to accomplish this, we need to change and re-align
our research organizational structure for success.
Collaboration allows scientists and scholars to leverage specific skills to advance the
sorts of interdisciplinary, multi contextual projects that are increasingly the norm in
our rapidly changing and enormously complex research and development environment.
I am announcing today the creation of a new Office of Research Advancement.
This office will provide the infrastructure to help us more successfully pursue large
interdisciplinary grants AND other grants that we have not traditionally received.
For example, this office will help in pursuing NSF science and technology centers, or new
National Endowment for the Humanities grants.
This office will help develop grant writing skills and provide professional editing for
the large center level grants.
The Office of Research will lead the effort to create this support office.
The goal of clinical trials at MU is to uncover more effective treatments for Missourians
living with illness.
My goal is to leverage our clinical infrastructure so we can double - or more -- the funding
of clinical trials at Mizzou.
This effort will further advance our clinicians and MU health, as leaders in clinical care.
The School of Medicine and MU Health Care researchers are currently working on more
than 500 clinical trials at various levels of recruitment and progress.
These trials delve into a variety of illnesses and diseases ranging from autism and cancer
to chronic pain management and obesity.
The University of Missouri's Participate in Discovery Initiative takes the pursuit of
breakthroughs further, asking community members to play a significant role in health research.
By signing up, Missourians can play an active part in research studies, creating a database
of people willing to participate in research that aligns with their interests.
Clinicians and researchers will have a ready source of participants willing to answer telephone
interviews, complete surveys or participate in clinical trials.
By getting involved, Missourians can become partners in the future of our state's health
as we become a national leader in health research.
The MU College of Veterinary Medicine uses clinical trials to advance treatment of the
animals we love.
From cancer and vaccines to antibiotics and vitamin D, their work aims to figure out whether
or not promising laboratory results can solve real-world problems with disease in animals
and occasionally works to see whether this work can translate into humans.
I look forward to seeing many more examples on campus in the next five years.
Core facilities like our Bond Life Sciences Center and our Metabolomics Center help to
expand the scale and scope of MU's collaborative research enterprise, making it easier for
MU researchers to network with other research centers, scientists and scholars nationwide.
These research centers also spur the sorts of exciting ideas and innovations that federal,
state and industrial funding agencies are eager to support.
Spaces like these help our faculty scientists and scholars "think bigger" and envision new,
innovative and comprehensive centers of discovery.
These facilities provide access to expensive equipment that single labs or departments
would find difficult or impossible to support individually.
By pairing that with specialized expertise from dedicated scientists, they play a significant
role in getting research from hypothesis to published discovery.
Centers like the Christopher S. Bond Life Sciences Center take shared facilities in
a different direction.
Designed with teamwork in mind, this center provides facilities and a culture of sharing
to a pool of high-achieving scientists across divisions.
This culture allows researchers to form collaborations to solve problems in human and animal health,
the environment and agriculture.
Engineers are working with cancer biologists, plant scientists with biomedical researchers,
lab researchers with field biologists, and information technology experts with biologists.
We're also training the next generation of collaborators through undergraduate and graduate
research.
Facilities like the University of Missouri Research Reactor (MURR) support scientific
advancement through its 10-megawatt facility, the most powerful university research reactor
in the country.
MURR supports the research of about 400 faculty and 150 graduate students from around the
world.
These researchers represent more than 100 universities and about
40 federal and industrial labs.
The National Swine Resource and Research Center was established in 2003 to develop the infrastructure
to ensure that biomedical investigators across a variety of disciplines have access to critically
needed swine models of human health and disease.
The Center also serves as a central resource for reagents, creation of new genetically
modified swine, and information and training related to use of swine models in biomedical
research.
We will work to attract 3 to 5 additional externally funded national research centers
in the next 5 years.
National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, and other federal agencies all
have competitions for centers that address some of the nation's most complex challenges.
These multidisciplinary national centers break down walls and eliminate barriers, act as
a shared resource for our scholars and help us to attract additional grants and gain prestige.
One of the biggest examples of our opportunity to do this is through the planned Translational
Precision Medicine Complex.
Translational medicine "translates" advancements made in lab into new drugs, devices and treatments
that improve human health using the bench-to-bedside model.
Think about it....this enables us to deliver customized patient care based on an individual's
genetics, environment and lifestyle.
The TPMC will bring together industry partners, multiple schools and colleges on campus, and
the federal government to advance precision medicine through new diagnostics and therapies
and create new companies based on these innovations.
Our new Translation Precision Medicine Complex will serve - along with already well-established
facilities such as the Bond Life Science Center - as exemplars of this crucial change in our
research culture.
So far, this project has already featured collaboration with the Cerner Corporation,
the Tiger Institute for Health and MU Schools and Colleges of Medicine, Engineering, Veterinary
Medicine, Health and Environmental Sciences, Arts and Sciences and the Research Reactor.
The TPMC will help MU emerge as a global leader in biomedical research and will maximize opportunities
for external grant funding.
It will also enhance our ability to recruit and retain the most talented researches.
As we pursue the TPMC, we want to avoid the traditional, siloed approach where functions
or disciplines are housed in one prescribed area.
Instead, we will work to integrate different functions to better support collaboration
and cross-pollination of ideas.
Today I am also announcing Mizzou Innovates, an annual competition that will focus on engaging
our students, faculty, and staff in identifying and proposing, and hopefully demonstrating,
solutions to the grand challenges in our state, country and world.
Solutions to these complex challenges require multidisciplinary approaches that include
our research and creative activities.
Examples in our state are access to broadband, or providing better health care in rural areas.
In the world they include feeding the world in 2050 - something that Missouri can contribute
to in a significant way.
This effort will encourage innovation and entrepreneurship in solving problems that
improve our lives.
Earlier this month, Dr. Mark McIntosh and many other leaders across campus traveled
to Tarkio in northwest Missouri to participate in discussions around the opportunities and
challenges around putting up wind turbines in that community.
The group visited with community stakeholders, met with Missouri Farm Bureau President Blake
Hurst and toured various sites in and around Tarkio.
It was an excellent opportunity to seek out ways in which MU can provide research-based
solutions to help the decision-making process in local communities related to clean energy
and wind turbines.
Partnerships such as these can help the state and local communities leverage the tremendous
resources Mizzou can provide and can fit within the Mizzou Innovates concept.
As part of the Mizzou Innovates Challenge, we will host a symposium where people can
come together to learn more about grand challenges and hear about proposed and realized solutions
developed by our faculty, students and staff.
I have asked the Provost to determine the structure and process of this initiative.
It should be an opportunity not just to lend our expertise to help solve challenges, but
also a way to connect the University and the community and to communicate all the ways
our scholarship helps society.
Up until now, I have talked a lot about research and creative activities.
And you can probably see the former Vice President for Research and Economic Development in me.
I wanted to talk about everything that we do. But what I want to talk about now
is to shift to discuss how our in education, research and creative activities
impact the economy of the local community, state and world.
Our alumni represent a wide reach.
We have more than 130,000 in Missouri, each contributing in their own way in every county.
And our alumni represent Mizzou across the country.
And across the world.
As a very specific example of economic impact of these alums, more than 2,000 physician
alumni of our School of Medicine currently practice across the state of Missouri, from
the most rural areas to the more urban ones.
It is estimated that each of these physicians contribute on the order of $2.1 million annually
to the economy, for a total impact of $4.3 billion.
We have noteworthy impacts in other health related areas as well.
245 students graduated from our nursing school since December 2016, and more than 73% of
these nurses are now employed in Missouri with an average starting pay of $48,000.
We can think of many ways we impact the economy.
Indeed, it is part of our four-part mission of teaching, research, service and - economic
development.
Here are just a few examples, from grants to partnering with industry to attracting
private gifts.
And most importantly, the impact of over 8,000 credentials we award to students who graduate
from Mizzou each year.
Many of these students enter the workforce and others continue on to get even additional
degrees.
Then there are the tremendous contributions our journalism faculty, staff and students
make in their daily work with KOMU-TV, KBIA Radio, the Missourian and other news and magazine
offerings, and Ad-Zou, a group of talented students that develop marketing and advertising
campaigns for companies across the nation.
And the arts and humanities provide economic impact.
A 2015 study in Columbia found that arts and culture generated more than $14 million in
local economic activity in areas such as the arts, humanities, theater and music.
Much of that is related to the University, and we all benefit.
Here, we provide our students with an opportunity to learn with others in a diverse setting.
According to a McKinsey study that recently came out, businesses and organizations that
are diverse in terms of gender and ethnicity are much more successful financially than
those that are not.
Today's employers and industry leaders want students who are ready to work with others
to embrace a global economy. We provide that.
In the past year, under the leadership of Dr. Kevin McDonald, we have developed a new
inclusive excellence framework that shapes the steps organizations or institutions can
take to provide their employees or members with opportunities to become more successful
in today's global marketplace.
Kevin's framework has been embraced by several different organizations.
So what does this mean to the University?
It means our students are prepared for success - no matter what their area of study.
That is why more than 5,500 employers recruited students on campus last year.
We expect there to be even more this year.
The examples I've shared this morning of work taking place at MU help illustrate how our
Research Enterprise is a powerful economic engine.
Consider that we have annual expenditures of $200 million for research.
We bring $16.9 million in fee-for-service revenues and license $8.9 million from technology.
The UM System is currently completing a study that will provide much more detail on the
overall impact of the University on the state and nation.
We expect the results of that study to be released in the next month.
MU has a robust entrepreneurial ecosystem made up of education and training, corporate
engagement, and research innovations.
This ecosystem has enabled us to launch several companies.
Here are a few of the recent examples.
We plan to have many more in the future.
There is a clear correlation between innovation and economic growth.
However, research discoveries and innovations are worth very little unless they enter the
marketplace where they can provide societal and economic growth.
The innovation ecosystem at MU includes the management of our intellectual property, translational
research like the Coulter Program, industry partnerships and for entrepreneurs.
Finally, I want to give an example of recent success of one of our students who started
their own company.
Consider Bea Doheny, who is majoring in business in the Trulaske School of Business.
She has always loved the solar system and has a keen eye for fashion and a passion for
arts and crafts.
In 2016, she launched AstronoBEAds, a jewelry business with a space theme.
She has shipped hundreds of accessories all over the world.
Here are examples of additional products made possible with MU innovations/intellectual
property.
They have had a far-reaching impact.
Heartburn sufferers find relief from Zegerid, a medicine that combines a proton-pump inhibitor
acid blocker with an antacid.
Net sales have exceeded $1.3 billion worldwide.
MU's soy-based meat substitute that replicates the taste, texture and appearance of chicken
helped launch Beyond Meat, a plant-based meat company that has products in 19,000 stores
and restaurants.
More than four million patients have benefited from OBERD, the world's largest orthopedic
outcomes database.
OBERD enables physicians and hospitals to collect the data they need to make better
patient-care decisions, ultimately improving health outcomes.
The company has clients in 34 states, including four of the nation's top five orthopedic hospitals.
Market forces require the university's ecosystem to be dynamic and continually evolve.
We are in the process of re-envisioning how we fulfill our economic development mission
at Mizzou.
For example, we plan to invest more heavily in industry relationships by providing new
opportunities for them to have a presence on campus and for their researchers to collaborate
with ours.
Indeed, Mizzou is open for business.
And that means we must partner with businesses and the state to understand their needs and
ensure that we are preparing students for the opportunities that exist today and in
the future.
And we serve the state through MU Health Care.
Representing a third of our overall budget, MU Health Care reaches all corners of our
state, and served more than 216,000 patients last year.
These numbers reflect the significant impact of this important part of the institution.
As part of our mission, we serve patients from every county in Missouri.
This is particularly true for the patients in the 25-county service area you see here
in gold.
Taken in total, MU Health Care contributes more than $3 billion to the state's economy.
Economic impact can also be measured through the work of Extension and its business development program.
From 2015 to 2017, our Extension's Business Development Program helped create more than
800 new businesses and gain $347 million in new investments.
29,000 jobs were created or retained with Extension's help.
Our research centers can be found across the state, with each one drawing on expertise
that relates to issues facing the region.
The University draws Missourians from across the state and beyond.
A good example is the Agriculture Research Centers, which drew 36,000 people to field
days and other activities last year.
To give you an idea of just how valuable the Extension programs are to Missouri...for every
dollar invested, the University creates an $11 return on investment.
This translates to a $945 million in economic impact annually.
This is one of the best returns on investment you will find anywhere.
And, who can deny the powerful economic contributions we create through our athletics programs?
Eight of our teams are ranked in the top 25 nationally, we're part of the SEC, and anyone
who has attended a women's or men's basketball game lately knows that the fan base continues
to grow.
Not to mention the return of our football team to a bowl game last year and our volleyball
team reaching the NCAA Sweet 16 for the second year in a row.
This success on the field and the courts means economic success for Missouri - we estimate
the economic impact of our SEC activities is more than $294 million.
And with all of these successes, we still want to do more!
We are re-envisioning what the Library of the Future may look like, and how we can leverage
the library to provide even more support for innovation and creative activities.
How we use these spaces is changing, and we are excited about what that will look like
at Mizzou.
We look forward to continuing to work with Ann Riley to envision the library of the future.
And new facilities for the School of Music will provide space for the creativity of our
students and faculty who compose, perform and study music.
As we re-envision MU Extension and Engagement, Marshall Stewart is reorganizing our structure.
This will enable us to leverage connections, research and knowledge across Missouri, recommit
to community-based local and regional roots, and collaborate with rural and urban communities
on economic development issues specifically.
We are calling it All Things Missouri.
Extension is strengthening its data mapping and reporting system to better determine community
needs based on demographic data.
A University Impact web site is being developed to bring valuable knowledge and resources
directly to communities.
So all of these things we describe come together to benefit Missourians and the world in a
way that only a public research and land grant university can provide.
It takes being engaged, it takes thought leadership, it takes a determined work ethic.
It means taking chances and thinking outside the box.
That sounds a lot like Mizzou to me.
Earlier I described the concept of Mizzou Innovates - a way of bringing together
the heads of all of the people here at Mizzou to solve challenges.
But it won't end with that.
We have a responsibility - indeed it is part of our mission -- to see these ideas move
forward to new companies, products and services that benefit society.
It will take all of us to do that.
Clearly, these challenges will require us to re-envision what we think of as economic
development at Mizzou.
It means public-private partnerships.
It means working with business and industry.
It means collaboration, and funding entrepreneurial activities.
I'm ready to join you in getting to work on this.
Today, I've shared some highlights that stand out to me around the research and creative
activities taking place here, as well as the powerful impact we have on economic development.
There are more great examples of this work taking place right now in each of our 13 schools
and colleges at MU and many of our business units as well.
I hope you'll take a few minutes to visit the student displays upstairs and talk with
the talented undergraduate and graduate students who are engaged in research and creative projects.
As I mentioned at the beginning of my speech this morning, it's our people who make Mizzou
exceptional.
It takes our faculty, staff and students working together to create this unique atmosphere
of exploration, curiosity, hard work and collaboration.
I want to take a minute to recognize our Deans for their leadership making sure this University
continues to provide the kind of educational experiences our students should expect from
an AAU, Land Grant, Research One university.
Deans, can you please stand? [ Applause ]
I'd also like to recognize Jonathan Curtright, who may not be here due to flu, and Marshall Stewart.
So Marshall, you will have to stand all by yourself.
[ Applause ]
Their vision and leadership has helped us continue to grow our ability to bring valuable
services and information to citizens across Missouri.
In my first seven months here, I've been so impressed by the incredible people on this
campus and things we are accomplishing together.
Let's never lose sight of the power of Tigers coming together to create something amazing
that benefits all of us.
Thank you.
[ Applause ]
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