Summer 2004

Change and Continuity

By Clyde Willian, Chairman of the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology Board of Trustees

Change can generate a variety of emotions in any facet of life. Excitement, anxiety, joy, uncertainty and sadness are just a few of the sentiments that can surface when change occurs.

Rose-Hulman has gone through a transition this summer with the retirement of one president and the arrival of another. This can be a watershed event in the life of some colleges, but I am pleased to report that our leadership change leaves me with nothing but confidence about our future.

The reason for my confidence lies not in what has changed, but with the elements of our Institute that remain unchanged. These elements can leave us confident that Rose-Hulman’s best days truly lie ahead.

Rose-Hulman’s culture of collaboration and collegiality, and our focus on undergraduate engineering and science, have not changed this summer – they are part of the very fabric of the Institute, and have been for more than 120 years. Where did this culture originate? I think the answer lies with Chauncey Rose himself, and with the first president of Rose Polytechnic, Dr. Charles Thompson.

Chauncey Rose was not a learned man, but he was a learning man. He realized that the railroads – the biotechnology of 1870s – needed people who were able, in the words of an early historian of Rose-Hulman, to “blend the industrial sciences with the branches of knowledge usually taught in the schools and colleges.” When he decided to establish a school to accomplish this work, he commissioned a report studying the best educational practices in the U.S., and with those in mind, founded on October 10, 1874, the Terre Haute School of Industrial Science, which was later renamed over his objection and against his wishes, the Rose Polytechnic. After Chauncey Rose died, his friends hired Charles Thompson, who opened the school for instruction with a faculty of 6 in March 1883. It was a small, close-knit community, in which every member was an engineering educator – a few professors, and a few shop superintendents, but every one an educator.

Today we pride ourselves on maintaining the same close community as in 1883, where we are all educators, whether we teach in a lab, an office, an athletic field, a residence hall, a kitchen or the boiler room. This culture – which sets us apart from virtually every other institution of higher education – has been with us since Charles Thompson opened Rose Polytechnic 121 years ago. Since that time, employees who worked full-time in the machine shops were considered part of the “faculty of instruction.” The idea that we are all educators is not only a great way of working – it has been part of the fabric of Rose-Hulman for over 120 years. That fabric has not changed, and will not change.

As a new chapter opens in the history of Rose-Hulman, I have the utmost confidence in our new president. Jack Midgley brings a wealth of experience and energy to the office. There is no doubt we have selected a new president who has the leadership, strategic thinking and global experience in education and business that are needed to build upon the tremendous progress that has occurred for more than a century. We will continue to prosper under his leadership, but our success will be determined by all of us. We must work together with President Midgley to carry Rose-Hulman to new levels of success.

As Dr. Midgley steps into the role of president, we are reminded that the only constant in the world is change. At Rose- Hulman, it is time to embrace that constant and bid farewell while extending a welcome. We step forward into a promising future with confidence rooted in our strong heritage of success.