What a Year
Posted on Nov. 10, 2015From the release of the Wainstein report on academics and athletics in October 2014 until this October’s news that Professor Aziz Sancar had won the Nobel Prize for chemistry, our University has enjoyed remarkable achievements, experienced disappointments, suffered the passing of icons and the retirement of loyal University servants.
Douglas S. Dibbert ’70
Some of what we’ve celebrated:
■ Sarah M. Bufkin ’13 becomes Carolina’s 49th Rhodes Scholar.
■ Roughly 69,000 donors make 2014-15 the best year in philanthropy ever for Carolina — $447 million. Among them, Fred Eshelman ’72 pledges $100 million to the Eshelman School of Pharmacy — Carolina’s largest ever gift from an individual.
■ For the 11th straight year, Carolina receives a record number of undergraduate applications — 31,953 for an entering first-year class of 4,076.
■ UNC and GlaxoSmithKline agree to create an HIV Cure Center and jointly own a new company focusing on a cure for HIV/AIDS.
■ U.S News & World Report again ranks Carolina No. 5 among public research universities, and Kiplinger’s again ranks Carolina as “Best Buy.”
■ Carolina athletics finishes No. 5 in the Directors’ Cup.
Some of what has troubled and concerned us:
■ The Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges, UNC’s accreditation agency, launches a formal review, after which it puts the University — which has implemented 70 reforms in response to academic-athletic issues — on probation for one year.
■ The NCAA sends UNC a 59-page notice of allegations. In preparing its response, the University discovers additional possible violations, which it reports to the NCAA and awaits an updated NOA.
■ After a study of centers and institutes, the UNC System Board of Governors selects Carolina’s poverty center as one of three centers in the system to be closed.
■ The trustees conclude a yearlong study by voting to curate the campus and teach UNC’s history; renaming Saunders Hall to Carolina Hall; and declaring a 16-year freeze on renaming historical buildings, monuments, memorials and landscapes.
Some of how our leadership is changing:
■ With little explanation, the BOG votes to force out system President Tom Ross ’75 (JD); it later hires Margaret Spellings, who will take office in March 2016.
■ College of Arts and Sciences Dean Karen Gil announces she plans to step down; sports-related concussion expert Kevin Guskiewicz will succeed her. Announcements similar to Gill’s subsequently are made by Dean William McDiarmid ’69 at education and Dean Jack Richman at social work. Vice Chancellor for Research Barbara Entwisle announces her plans to return to the faculty, and Shirley Ort, director of scholarships and student aid, announces she will retire in June 2016, as will Joe Ferrell ’60 (’63 JD), longtime secretary of the faculty and a professor in the School of Government.
■ With the conclusion of the academic year, veteran faculty members Joy and John Kasson, Bruce Carney, Maeda Galinsky, Fred Brooks, James Peacock and Richard “Pete” Andrews retire, as does veteran senior associate director of athletics Beth Miller.
■ Martin Brinkley ’92 (JD) becomes UNC’s new law dean.
And some of those we lost in the past year:
■ Professor Fred Clark, the face to students of the Carolina Covenant;
■ Popular ESPN broadcaster Stuart Scott ’87;
■ Dean Smith;
■ Dental student Deah Barakat; his wife, Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha; and her sister, Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, whose deaths are mourned around the world;
■ Renowned history Professor William Powell ’40;
■ Dean Smith’s loyal, longtime assistant and successor, Bill Guthridge;
■ Professor and longtime Chapel Hill Mayor Jonathan Howes ’61 (MRP);
■ Nearing his 100th birthday, beloved and much respected former Chancellor William Aycock ’37 (MA, ’48 JD).
If Carolina were a stock, it would clearly remain a “buy.” But Carolina is not a stock. It is a great, global, public research university with more than 309,000 alumni, in excess of 29,000 students, 3,500-plus faculty and about 10,000 staff. It excels in ways that extend beyond such numbers: For example, when Professor Sancar and his wife, Gwen, came to Carolina in 1982, UNC was the only university that offered faculty positions to them both.
Aside from the news story of any day, positive or negative, the real work of our University takes place quietly, every day, in Carolina’s classrooms and laboratories.
As we prepare for a new year, let us reflect on this tumultuous and momentous year, on those who shaped it and remain grateful to those who now lead and serve our alma mater. They are stewards of our Carolina diplomas and need and deserve our continuing understanding and support.
Yours at Carolina,
Douglas S. Dibbert ’70
