This article originally appeared along with a feature story on President Houshmand’s goals for the next decade. Last year, Rowan University became the nation’s third fastest-growing public research institution and Dr. Houshmand committed to serve until 2029.
There was no fanfare on July 1, 2011. No regalia. No speeches. No gathering of dignitaries. There was work. Maybe a few congratulations, but mostly work.
Ali Houshmand, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs since September 2006, officially took the helm of Rowan University as interim president that day and he didn’t miss a beat.
Rowan couldn’t sit still or take time to celebrate. Neither could he.
He said, “I am honored to serve Rowan University as interim president. This is a strong community. These are exciting times. In the five years I have been at Rowan, we enjoyed remarkable growth and exceptional opportunities. I look forward to continuing to work to further develop educational opportunities at Rowan that serve our students and build the region.”
Exciting times. Remarkable growth. Exceptional opportunities. Those phrases turned out to be more of a prediction than a reflection, more of a vision than aspiration.
This spring, the man who was appointed president in June 2012 and inaugurated in September 2013 marked 1,000 days leading Rowan University. Those 1,000 days have indeed lived up to everything he said three short—and busy—years ago.
Though observers are more likely to see Houshmand in a meeting with elected officials talking about funding or with corporate executives discussing research collaboration, but his first commitment is to education.
When it comes to his views on education, people on and off campus often have used the word “visionary” to describe Houshmand. He’ll accept that term, though he doesn’t much think about it.
They also have used the word “demanding.” That does not make him wince. His expectations are high for himself. They are high for others, too.
The results are obvious.
During his tenure, Rowan has reconfigured some of its colleges, a logistical move to join related programs in communication and the arts under one roof and to separate the sprawling College of Liberal Arts & Sciences into two colleges: Humanities & Social Sciences and Science & Mathematics.
The University also expanded its academic offerings to better meet the needs of today’s students and the demands of today’s employers. In the last three years, Rowan added more than 30 new bachelor’s, master’s, doctoral and professional degree programs and program options, including a handful of new concentrations, minors and certifications.
Students have been flocking to Rowan in record numbers. Enrollment grew from 11,392 in fall 2010 to 13,349 in fall 2013. And the profile of the entering classes continued to improve. The average SAT scores for first-time regularly admitted freshmen in fall 2010 were 1,169; in 2013 they were 1,203.
“When we appointed Ali president, we knew we had in him a leader who could address the present and the future of our University,” said Linda Rohrer, chairman of the Rowan University Board of Trustees. “We knew we had a leader who would rethink higher education.”
For Houshmand, education is “the great equalizer.” At the 2014 undergraduate Commencement ceremony in May, Houshmand told about his life—beginning impoverished in Iran, always striving for opportunity—and why he so values education: “Education does not care about our past, but only our present and future. Education changes what was and capitalizes on what is, providing us the chance to go where our potential allows.”
With that conviction, Houshmand has led Rowan to solidify its role in providing outreach to K-12 districts and strengthened its relationships with South Jersey county colleges, most notably Gloucester County College.
In January, Rowan and GCC expanded their partnership to provide an alternate, less expensive path to earning a four-year college degree with dual enrollment at the University and GCC—still autonomous, but renamed Rowan College at Gloucester County. The name change emphasizes the commitment the institutions share in improving students’ access to education and the efficiency of the curriculum, made more convenient and effective with professional advisors dedicated to students’ success on both campuses.
Because he knows the power of education to transform, it is a critical concern for Houshmand. Fortunately, what weighs on him also invigorates him. “We have an obligation to our students and to our region,” he said. “We must constantly re-evaluate what we can do and what we must do to ensure exceptional educational experiences in New Jersey.”
Those exceptional experiences include medical education. In summer 2012, Rowan, in partnership with Cooper University Health Care, opened Cooper Medical School of Rowan University in the City of Camden to help stem the shortage of physicians in the Garden State and train a new generation of doctors focused on patients and community.
A year later, historic New Jersey legislation restructured the state’s medical education and higher education and transferred to Rowan the Stratford-based School of Osteopathic Medicine and Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.
In two brief, breathtaking years, Rowan became only the second institution in the nation to offer both M.D.- and D.O.-degree granting programs. Both medical schools came to Rowan because of confidence at the state level that the institution was up to the enormous challenge and would thrive amidst great change.
The 2013 restructuring legislation took effect just as Houshmand headed into the home stretch of his first 1,000 days leading the University. A great number of those days found the president pointing out the conspicuous gap in higher education resources in the southern part of the state. He demonstrated the disparity in terms of available seats in classrooms: approximately 100 adults for every southern New Jersey college opening versus the national ratio of 30 to one.
Houshmand’s telling of the situation ends with a dark and potent result of the higher education data: when New Jersey’s youth leave the state for college, many of them don’t return to build their careers as professionals and residents. That means fewer talented and skilled New Jerseyans helping build business and industry, fewer teaching, leading and investing in our communities—and fewer returning tax revenues to advance New Jersey’s next generation.
Finally, the 2013 legislative support and recognition of Rowan as the state’s second public comprehensive research university have opened doors to opportunities for increased government and industry funding and expanded partnerships to increase access to education and tackle some of the most critical concerns in health care, the environment, technology and more.
“We have the qualifications to seek and develop partnerships with public and private innovators who are interested in bringing new processes and products to market,” Houshmand said. “Rowan’s research focus is on technology commercialization and initiatives that lead to patents that make a difference in the real world. We are doing exciting work, important work.”
In just the last year, the University has received over $18.4 million in sponsored research grants and contracts from federal, state and private sources. This is the highest total of externally sponsored funding in Rowan’s history and represents a 65 percent increase over the previous year. At the same time, the University has solidified existing business and industry partnerships and engaged new ones. Today, Rowan’s portfolio includes 20 current or pending patents and five licensing agreements, and the University expects 50 new invention disclosures in FY14.
Rowan’s obligations do not end at classroom doors. Programs, services and facilities that support students’ success in college are vital. In just the past year, Rowan opened a new Wellness Center where students find health, counseling and emergency medical services. An addition to the Green Team House serves student-athletes and hosts special events. The renovated Tohill Theatre in Bunce Hall opened last fall for performances.
Just a short walk east of Evergreen Hall on the southeast edge of campus is Rowan Boulevard. A public-privatepublic partnership of the Borough of Glassboro, private developers and Rowan, the boulevard is a $300-million redevelopment project that links the campus to downtown.
Begun in 2008, Rowan Boulevard has flourished during the last three years under Houshmand’s leadership with the opening of a Barnes & Noble Collegiate Superstore, Courtyard at Marriott hotel, student housing, shops, restaurants and more.
David Burgin ’82, M’02, Rowan University Alumni Association Board president, has watched Rowan’s transformation with great interest, and he’s in touch with graduates of various generations.
“The alumni from the last 10 to 20 years are really engaged with coming back to the University,” Burgin said. “The recent changes have made a tremendous impact on the pride of our earlier alumni and newer ones. Once people come back and see what is going on here, a whole new sense of pride emerges.”
Among Rowan’s watershed moments in its distant and recent past, none was more transformational than the $100-million gift from businessman Henry Rowan and his late wife, Betty, in 1992. Virtually everyone in New Jersey, higher education and philanthropy knew the story of how the gift helped found a College of Engineering and elevate a solid, small state college into regional prominence. In many ways, that gift defined the institution and still defines it today.
But fast-forward two decades: the definition has expanded and the transformation continues.
As Rowan has evolved, contributions to the University have increased immensely. Since July 2011, Houshmand and University Advancement staff members have raised nearly $21 million in new gifts and pledges, including 23 major gifts of $100,000 or more, with several surpassing the $1 million mark.
That two of those major gifts came from the Henry M. Rowan Family Foundation and William G. Rohrer Charitable Foundation reflects the confidence that major donors have in the University and its leadership. A $3 million grant from the esteemed Robert Wood Johnson Foundation further underscores how major national institutions view Rowan’s capacity to address issues—in this instance, health care delivery.
Corporate and industrial executives—some with longtime ties to the University and others who see the potential—exhibit that confidence, too, and are counting on Rowan to deliver more than ever before.
In March, Rowan announced the expansion of a strategic partnership with global defense giant Lockheed Martin to develop new technologies for a broad range of radar system applications in support of national defense. Lockheed will conduct research with College of Engineering teams in a planned second building at the South Jersey Technology Park at Rowan University, a little more than a mile from the Glassboro campus.
The Lockheed Martin project is one of dozens of research projects under way at the University and the Tech Park. As Rowan welcomes research and development with external partners, it also is producing homegrown innovators with great potential. To encourage these talented and ambitious faculty, students and alumni, in March the Rowan University Foundation committed to allocate $5 million to a new venture capital fund to fuel new research initiatives coming from within the Rowan community. The fund is a bold step for a public university and its philanthropic arm. It’s also a decisive move that affirms Houshmand’s commitment to explore new ideas for the institution and the pioneers it is cultivating.
With so much growth and change in academic programs, research and partnerships, Rowan also has plans for construction to accommodate expansion. To that end, in another vote of confidence in Rowan’s trajectory, the state awarded Rowan the second highest amount in 2013 Building Our Future Bond Act funds: $117 million. The funding will mostly go to new buildings for the College of Engineering and the Rohrer College of Business, enabling both to double their enrollment to nearly 2,000 students each and meet demands in the competitive programs.
“There is something fundamental at play here,” Houshmand said. “The State of New Jersey and its leaders, starting with the governor and Senate President Steve Sweeney, believe in Rowan University. No one makes the kind of investment—no one entrusts one institution to that extent—unless he or she is convinced that the institution will capitalize on the opportunities it has been offered.”
With confidence so strong at the highest levels and expectations so consequential all around, the president keeps working, not only to reach goals, but also to honor the commitment of the many people working alongside him and to honor the promise of countless new possibilities for Rowan.
“Where we are today ultimately is thanks to the professor in the classroom, the graduate donating to her alma mater for decades, the board member volunteering year-round, the business that supports our research. Where we are today is thanks to everyone who has done his or her job—and more,” he added.
“Where we are today is a place we did not even dream about five years ago.”