Anthony A. Williams, Mayor of Washington, DC, welcomes NAICU Conference participants.

• ANAC Presidents Visit US News
• ANAC Presidents Council Meets during NAICU Conference
• Institutional Representatives Meet following AACU Conference
  
• CFO Benchmarking Conference at Elon University
  
• Data Exchange Reports 1998-2001 Data; Prepares to Collect 2001-02 Data
  
• Faculty Work Project Readies Next Phase
• University of Hartford Summer Program Added to ANACSA

ANAC Presidents Visit US News

Presidents Loren Anderson (PLU), Hal Wilde (North Central), and Bob Fisher (Belmont University) met with US News' Anne McGrath, Assistant Managing Editor, and Robert J. Morse, Director of Data Research, on February 4. In a session arranged by Maggy Ralbovsky, ANAC media advisor, McGrath and Morse outlined US News plans to gather experiential learning data, e.g., internships, service learning, and study abroad, in rating colleges and to ask respondents to name programs that are exemplars of excellence at other institutions with which they are familiar. US News plans to request this information as additional evidence for this year's ratings.

ANAC Presidents Council Meets during NAICU Conference

NAICU's annual conference (National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities) was again the setting for the winter meeting of the Presidents Council on February 5, in Washington, DC. In addition to a lively roundtable discussion of the role of the president as an academic leader, the presidents approved the preliminary 2002-03 ANAC budget and by law revisions recommended by the institutional representatives. They also discussed steps to encourage all ANAC members to send teams to the Senior Leadership Conference at North Central College, June 14-15. Robert Weisbuch, president of the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, discussed new initiatives that may provide opportunities for ANAC.

Institutional Representatives Meet following AACU Conference

ANAC's institutional representatives held their winter meeting in Washington, DC, January 26-27, immediately following adjournment of the AACU annual conference. The "Reps" deliberated on matters of ANAC finances, governance, membership, grant initiatives, and planning for the Senior Leadership Conference. They held roundtable discussions on matters such as hiring practices and faculty compensation and ways that they might use ANAC's new faculty work project book, A New Academic Compact (Anker Press, 2002) for strategic institutional purposes. During the AACU Conference, ANAC sponsored two panel sessions of member case studies, one on the theme, "School Partnerships in the Inner City: Educating Across a Cultural Divide"; the other on the theme, "Learning through Civic Engagement at Home and Abroad."

CFO Benchmarking Conference at Elon University

ANAC CFO's held their third annual benchmarking conference at Elon University, February 7-9. Highlights included a half-day presentation and discussion with Christopher Cowen, vice president at Prager, McCarthy & Sealy, on the five-year comparative analysis of ANAC member audited financial statements. The analysis extended to mean comparisons with a group of large universities and a group of small institutions, as well. The analysis included measures of financial viability useful in strategic planning and budgeting, such as deciding whether to use institutional resources or to incur debt in capital construction. CFO's also reviewed financial benchmarks they have identified that are gathered through the ANAC Data Exchange. The roundtable portion of the meeting ranged across topics such as privatizing residence halls, addressing rising health care and fringe benefit costs, and strategies for managing risks. One session included a lawyer specialist on intellectual property and another focused on member incentive-based faculty compensation plans.

Data Exchange Reports 1998-2001 Data; Prepares to Collect 2001-02 Data

Member presidents, institutional representatives, CFO's, and Exchange member institutional research contacts received a hard copy report in December on the member data collected in the first three years of the ANAC Data Exchange. Primarily consisting of IPEDS, CDS, and internally generated outcomes data, the Exchange contains more than 250 data items divided into the five categories of performance (graduation rates and student achievements), enrollment and selectivity, faculty and staff, programs, and financials. Members may enter the Exchange through the ANAC web site (http://www.anac.org) and must have the institutional user name and password to access the online reporting program. The Exchange allows users to select a subset of ANAC members for comparison and benchmarking purposes.

Data gathering for 2001-02 will begin in May, after IPEDS and CDS submissions are completed, in order to facilitate data entry.

Faculty Work Project Readies Next Phase

In an effort to continue its focus on faculty in the wake of its Pew grant project and the appearance of A New Academic Compact (Anker Press, 2002), ANAC has been meeting with higher education association directors of other Pew-funded projects focusing on faculty issues. This inquiry may lead to a proposal for funding to establish a national think-tank helpful in the implementation of ANAC Academy, as a comprehensive faculty development program for ANAC members. A New Academic Compact articulates a strategic partnership between institutions and faculty as academic communities. This framework founded on mutuality and reciprocity, however, is only a beginning, as faculty and their institutions seek to address the new students, new technologies, new expectations, and new financial pressures—and the accompanying workload and governance issues—of the coming decade.

University of Hartford Summer Program Added to ANACSA

This notice is a heads-up for ANAC member study abroad advisors that the University of Hartford is offering a summer program, July 7-31, 2002, "Discovering Britain," at Hertford College of Oxford University. The program will focus on Elizabethan drama and history and will be co-taught by Oxford and Hartford professors. The program will feature lectures, field trips to museums, galleries, and historical sites, and attendance at plays. The cost is $3,000, a 2.5 GPA is required, and the application deadline is March 26, 2002. Airfare, required medical insurance, and some personal expenses are extra. For an application or further information, contact Domenica Di Matteo, Study Abroad Administrator at the University of Hartford (Tel: 860-768-5100; email: ddimatteo@mail.hartford.edu).

ANAC member panelists at AACU conference session, from l, Kathleen McCourt, Quinnipiac; Barbara Temple-Thurston, PLU; Dick Ferguson, Dayton; and Stuart Shulman, Drake, observe as chaplain Mark Radecke describes the Susquehanna service learning program in Central America.