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Moeser Raises the Bar For More Research Dollars

Carolina, which just set a new record in attracting research grants and contracts, has set an even higher bar for pulling in research funding.

In his annual State of the University address last week, Chancellor James Moeser said, “We should never be content with the status quo. Good enough is never good enough – not for an institution that aspires to be America’s leading public university.”

To achieve that distinction requires the University to seek greater investments in research, Moeser said, announcing a target for UNC to obtain $1 billion in annual research grants by 2015.

By the end of the most recent fiscal year, UNC’s total amount of research grants and contracts grew to a new high of $593 million.

The total represents a 2.4 percent increase from fiscal 2005’s $579 million, and it’s more than twice the amount the University received as recently as 1997.

The growth comes at a time when the National Institutes of Health, which historically has accounted for slightly more than half of all research funding at UNC, experienced a cut in appropriations in 2006 with no increase expected for 2007.

Moeser, who delivered the first State of the University address six years ago and has continued the tradition every year thereafter, thanked campus administrators, faculty, staff and policymakers for their support of the University. He also urged them to continue striving for excellence.
Among other priorities he outlined:

  • Improve graduation rates: Moeser said the six-year graduation rate should be improved to 87 percent from 84 percent to match that of peer schools by 2010. The four-year graduation rate should also be improved, he said. The University already is looking at policies to enforce its expectation that students graduate in eight semesters.
  • Strengthen faculty recruitment and retention: An annual 6 percent salary increase by the N.C. General Assembly, supplemented by modest campus-based tuition increases, will bring UNC faculty salaries into the 67th percentile for faculty salaries among public and private peer universities by 2011. Moeser also said he wants to continue increasing the number of endowed professorships at Carolina.
  • Connect with North Carolina and the world: Carolina should continue to work with other universities academically and engage in service to the state in K-12 education, health and economic development. Next spring, UNC plans to dedicate the FedEx Global Education Center, a $39 million facility now under construction on the western edge of the campus. The facility – roughly the size of the Undergraduate Library – is designed to bring various international activities under one roof.
  • Carolina North: Moeser reiterated that development of the planned research campus is critical to UNC’s future. The UNC Board of Trustees has directed the University to submit zoning and development plan applications for Carolina North to the local governments by Oct. 1, 2007.

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