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Research and Scholarship

Let’s look at a few definitions from Webster’s:

Research "diligent and systematic enquiry into a subject in order to discover or revise facts/theories etc."

Scholarship "the accumulated knowledge of a group of scholars".

Creativity "the ability to create inventions, produce works of art, or solve problems using an original, novel, or unconventional approach."

Academy "a group of leaders in the field of scholarship, etc. who are often permitted to dictate standards, prescribe methods, criticize new ideas".

The last of these definitions harks back to the ancient Greek philosophers (check out Plato’s Academy). The concept of the academy was revived in the middle ages with the foundation of the first university (Bologna, 1088) and remains valid today. The concepts of research, creative activities and scholarship are relevant to the roles of faculty, staff and students in a modern research university such as UAHuntsville. Faculty members at a research university are expected to create new knowledge so that their disciplines continue to grow and so that the next generation of students learns the latest advances and disagreements in the field. Much of the scholarly research of faculty is impossible without major contributions from staff and graduate/undergraduate students.

In our role of setting standards, faculty members first transfer their knowledge through their teaching, instill in students the ability to think critically and to create new knowledge, then grade students on their learning of the accepted knowledge, finally awarding bachelors, masters and doctoral degrees when accepted standards have been achieved. In the case of the last two degrees, faculty members work with students to create new knowledge and new works of art and performances through research and creative activity. Beyond the doctoral degree, scholars prescribe further standards for themselves, recognizing even higher knowledge attainment via admission to learned societies, such as the L'Académie Française (1635), the Royal Society (1660) and, in the U.S., the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1780), the National Academy of Sciences (1863), the National Academy of Engineering (1964) and the Institute of Medicine (1970). Likewise, all academic disciplines have their own professional organizations (ACS, AHA, AMA, ANA, IEEE, etc.) to which faculty and others can be elected at various levels such as Member or Fellow (the latter term obviously reflecting the times of their founding). In a similar vein, long-established academic honor societies recognize leading student scholars via admission to Phi Beta Kappa (1776), Tau Beta Pi (1885), Sigma Xi (1886), Phi Kappa Phi (1896) among others.

Within the UA System, the Board of Trustees recognizes the role of ongoing scholarly research by requiring that faculty salaries be broadly divided into 60 percent for teaching 20 percent for research and 20 percent for service to the institution and the profession. (Individual distributions vary widely within different arms of the university and at different stages of a professor’s career.) Professorial service is the essential work of running an academic department and college as well as getting involved in our own professional learned societies in order to stay current in our respective disciplines. In addition, we are responsible as a University to serve as a driver of positive change for the scientific, technological, cultural and socio-economic prosperity of our community, region, and nation. Research across the university helps with this responsibility

Furthermore, a typical academic salary is paid for only 9 months of the year with the remaining 3 summer months available for extra teaching and/or the pursuit of scholarly research. In some disciplines (e.g. science, engineering, business) it is expected that faculty earn summer salary to augment the academic year salary. In others (e.g. arts, humanities) that is much more challenging. However, colleagues in these areas, especially in the fine and performing arts, can be paid in these months to collaborate with other artists and to perform with colleagues.

UAHuntsville is defined within the Carnegie Classification of U.S. universities as a "high research activity" university recognizing the importance of research to our university. This classification is based on an aggregate level of research activity including the number and distribution of masters and doctoral degree programs. For more details, see http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/classifications/index.asp?key=798. A "high research activity" classification places UAHuntsville in the top 10 percent of the almost 2,000 4-year accredited degree-granting colleges and universities in the U.S.

So, research is at the heart of our university, reflecting the scholarly achievements of our faculty. Research is also the major part of the total budget of our university. Last year $65M out of a total budget of $160M was expended on research. Theses funds came not from undergraduate tuition but from external sources such as the federal government, industry, private foundations, etc. Research expenditures are one of several external measures of our ranking as a university and (for better or worse) these dollars are highly influential in determining many of the better known rankings such as those published by the National Research Council, the National Science Foundation and USNews. In fact, according to the Integrated Post-secondary Education Data System, our current level of expenditures ranks us second only to Georgia Tech in the Southern Universities Group in terms of expenditures as a fraction of total expenses. In the latest (2006) NSF rankings of federal research expenditures, we rank 155th in the nation. No other public university of our size in the country generates such large research expenditures. We should be proud of this achievement, which reflects well on our faculty and research staff.

While the subject of rankings is in itself controversial, there is no doubt that rankings affect how students choose departments and universities, how funding is awarded by federal agencies, how foundations view universities, and how the corporate sector selects institutions for support and employment of graduating students.

All of these aspects of research and scholarship are also reflected in two of our Power of Ten goals – to increase research expenditures to $100M/year ($108) and to increase the output of doctorates to 100 students/year (102). Attaining these goals would today put us in the company of the top 100 national research universities (excluding those with medical schools). Succeeding in these goals is the quickest and surest way to ensure that UAHuntsville degrees remain highly valued in the outside world and that the scholarly work of our faculty continues to be recognized. Such goals also mean that we will continue to attract and retain the best faculty who, in turn, will attract the best students who wish to study in a university with rigorous academic standards. Last, but by no means least, it should now be clear why leadership of the research mission of the university is crucial and so we will soon be appointing a new VP for Research whose principal tasks will be raising the quality and quantity of our research and scholarly work, in part by attaining the goals just described, and in ensuring that the aspects of research and scholarship are integrated, rather than, separated, at UAHuntsville.

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