Board of Trustees December 2016 Meeting Review

Dear Faculty & Staff,

Earlier this month, the Board of Trustees met and took action on several important items I want to share with you. We also reviewed with the board a number of current initiatives now underway on campus.

There was a good discussion of our work to recruit a new leader for the Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion through a national search. We talked about the timeline involved, the appointment of Pete Erschen and Bevin McCarthy as interim leaders, and Daniel Eisen and David Fuentes as co-chairs of an advocacy team to support them. Discussion also centered on the campus climate here at Pacific and other institutions, particularly in light of the recent election.

With the board we also reviewed our enrollment and efforts to reach our goal of 2000 undergraduate and graduate students by 2020. We are making good progress toward those goals with the current enrollment of 1,984 graduate students and 1,946 at the undergraduate level. We also shared with the Board the shortfall in freshman and transfer students relative to budget, partially offset by better sophomore retention than projected, as well as the steps that are being taken to adjust the budget. The discussion included a look at a profile of our students as well as both national and regional enrollment trends. We also talked with the board about our new three-year budgeting process and how it will support our strategic planning efforts and help us focus on multi-year savings and investment opportunities that will assure each college’s long-term ability to thrive.

The board also reviewed our fundraising work including the successful efforts for the renovation of Jefferson Hall and the acquisition of the new College of Optometry EyeVan/Mobile Eye Clinic.

The action items the board passed included:

• Approval of a new Doctor of Pharmacy/Master of Science in Pharmaceutical Sciences joint degree program, which will begin in 2017-2018.
• A capital expenditure of $500,000 to replace the artificial turf surface at Hanson Stadium. The current turf field is now 10 years old (the useful life expectancy of a turf field) and is one of the most heavily used fields our technical consultants have seen. 
• Changing the university endowment payout rate to 4.25 percent (from the current 4.50 percent) beginning next fiscal year to bring us more in line with the market earnings and our peers.
• Approved the university’s audited financial statement for 2015-2016.
• At this meeting, we also welcomed our five new board members to their first meeting on the Pacific campus. The new members include Professor Graham Erickson ’88, OD ’90 (graduate faculty representative), Katie Ohene (graduate student representative), Norm Scott ’63, Sheri Garboden ’76 and Julia Brim-Edwards.
• Finally, board members and others gathered for the rededication of the new McGill Auditorium, where we honored Trustee Vice Chair Ken McGill and his parents for their legacy of generous support for the university.

My best wishes to all of you for a wonderful holiday.

Warmest regards,

Lesley M. Hallick, PhD

President