Blenda Wilson, Part 1

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: Prior to coming to The University Of Michigan-Dearborn I had been the Executive Director of the Colorado Commission on Higher Education, in which the governor and an independently appointed commission make policy for public higher education in Colorado. And before that I had for ten years been the Senior Associate Dean at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, in which, again, education policy and the framing of issues having to do with improving education in the 1980’s were things that I was involved in and concerned about.

Segment Synopsis: In this first segment, the interviewer and a member of the University of Michigan-Dearborn English Department, Elton Higgs, introduces former-Chancellor Blenda Wilson (in office 1988-1992). At the time of the interview, Dr. Wilson was serving as the Executive Director, President, and CEO of the Nellie Mae Educational Foundation in Braintree, Massachusetts. She begins by sharing her educational and professional background that led her to higher education administration. Dr. Wilson discusses how her experience acting as a liaison between education institutions and the state legislature at the Colorado Commission for Higher Education primed her for campus leadership positions.

Keywords: Boston College; Chancellor; Colorado Commission on Higher Education; Harvard Graduate School of Education; Higher education administration; Nellie Mae Educational Foundation; Nellie Mae Foundation; University of Michigan-Dearborn

Subjects: College administrators, African American; Universities and colleges--Administration; College administrators

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: When you start with the University of Michigan-Dearborn they already have experienced excellence, and then you hope you can persuade them to carry that experience into new challenges around schooling. And my fondest memory, truly, is the sense to which an institution can be respectful of the traditions of higher education and responsive to new challenges and changes.

Segment Synopsis: Blenda Wilson talks about her first impressions and conversations with university and campus leadership during the interview process. She recalls wanting the highlight her ability to rise to new educational challenges while working within an education system known for excellence. Wilson also starts discussing the initial conversations about the important relationship between the Dearborn campus and the city of Detroit.

Keywords: First impressions; Search Firm; Search Process; Search Process for Chancellor; Interviewing

Subjects: College administrators; University of Michigan--Dearborn; Interviewing--Anecdotes

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: People were keen to tell me, to help me understand that the relationship between Detroit and Dearborn had been tense throughout the earlier history of that era.

Segment Synopsis: Dr. Wilson starts to unpack the tense relations between the cities of Dearborn and Detroit which emerged in the wake former Dearborn Mayor Orville L. Hubbard's decades-long term (1942-1978). She says many of her early conversations with campus leadership centered around relations between the cities and its impact on attitudes toward the Dearborn campus. Wilson feels that she helped bridge the divide between cities during her time as chancellor.

Keywords: Detroit and Dearborn; Local Relations; Orville L. Hubbard; Relations; Detroit and University of Michigan-Dearborn

Subjects: Dearborn (Mich.); Detroit (Mich.); University of Michigan--Dearborn--History; Detroit Metropolitan Area (Mich.)--Politics and government

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: I think, that was very important in that context was to be able to sustain the enrollment and grow the enrollment of the campus despite the fact that there wasn’t a lot of additional money coming from Lansing.

Segment Synopsis: Blenda Wilsons continues describing the chancellor search and interview process. She says that many of the search committee's questions centered around Wilson's past experience as an "interpreter" for higher education institutions and the state legislature. Wilson initially believed that working with Michigan's less conservative administration would be "easier" compared to the legislature in Colorado. Elton Higgs then highlights Dr. Wilson's success with maintaining enrollment across her four-year term. Wilson recalls the somewhat difficult relationship between the University of Michigan and the State Legislature as a result of UM-Ann Arbor admitting a larger number of out-of-state students compared to Michigan's other major universities. According to Wilson, the perceived "arrogance" of the U of M system also impacted the university's relationship with the legislature and the general public.

Keywords: Ed Bagale; Institutional "arrogance"; Jim Blanchard; Jim Duderstadt; John Engler; Michigan Legilature; President's Council; Public opinion; Robin Fleming; University admissions; University of Michigan Presidents; University of Michigan-Dearborn; higher education institutions in Michigan; Harold Shapiro

Subjects: Universities and colleges--Administration--Law and legislation; Universities and colleges--Public relations; Universities and colleges--Michigan--Finance

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: That’s right. Yes. I remember—this is not in any order, but really perceiving that staff made a bigger contribution to the university than was reflected in their access to senior administrators. So we started doing, I don’t know what we called them then—meetings—they were just kind of open meetings—
ELTON HIGGS: Was that the beginning of the Policy Council?
BLENDA WILSON: Yes. To create a way of having people feel that their views were important.

Segment Synopsis: Blenda Wilson recalls her experience forging relationships with the faculty and staff. During her time as Chancellor, Dr. Wilson hosted "Policy Council" meetings, enabling faculty, staff, and administrators to have increased access to senior campus administration. She has utilized this strategy to build a sense of community at the other organizations she joined after leaving the University of Michigan.

Keywords: AAAC; Academic Affairs Advisory Committee; FACCA; Faculty Senate; Organizational community building; UM-Dearborn Policy Council; University administration; University of Michigan-Dearborn Policy Council; Faculty Advisory Committee on Campus Affairs

Subjects: Universities and colleges--Administration

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: I had the impression that the institution was very well administered on the finance and administration side, and Bob Behrens was your Vice President then. I’m not surprised that he’s been able to sustain and grow and keep the institution stable. I had a very negative impression of Student Affairs...

Segment Synopsis: Dr. Wilson shares her initial impressions of units on campus, including Campus Administration and Student Affairs. She talks about some of the administrators she encountered, including more difficult members of staff.

Keywords: Donna McKinley; Professional relationships; Student Affairs; Bob Behrens

Subjects: Student affairs administrators--United States--Anecdotes; Universities and colleges--Employees; Universities and colleges--Administration--Anecdotes

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: My sense was that in addition to crafting a vision that said, “We are not Ann Arbor, we are Dearborn, we’re a regional comprehensive university and proud of it. And we’re going to be the best regional comprehensive university we can be.” That’s how the Best In Class motif was developed. And that was borrowed from Ford Motor Company when they’d done the—when they made the cars, and said they were just going to look at all those cars of that type and build the best ones. But that meant, once you said that, then the requirement for leadership was really that they had a way of knowing how to articulate a comprehensive regional mission that was respectable, and how to keep pushing that point.

Segment Synopsis: Blenda Wilson talks about the message behind the "Best In Class" motif. It was intended to show UM-Dearborn as an excellent regional comprehensive university and establish its independence from the Ann Arbor campus. Dr. Wilson also talks about the motif led her to make changes to Academic Affairs, this included her reviewing faculty appointment and tenure folders as Chancellor, despite the professional disagreement of some of her colleagues.

Keywords: Academic Affairs; Faculty appointments; Faculty tenure; Gene Arden; Institutional identity; Professional disagreements; Professionalism; Regional comprehensive university; Robert Simpson; Role of University Chancellor; University marketing; University satillite campus; "Best In Class"

Subjects: Universities and colleges--Aims and objectives; Universities and colleges--Faculty; Universities and colleges--Administration--Anecdotes

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: And I think the difference in view was whether or not, if you’re going to have excellence in strength you can’t have sinecures that don’t relate to the ongoing—and that’s my view—investment of departments and divisions and colleges, schools, as it was, because they become isolated, they become insular, and they become dependent on the kind of funding and support from the provost’s office or the chancellor’s office.

Segment Synopsis: Elton Higgs asks Blenda Wilson about the dissolution of the Division of Interdisciplinary Studies, a unit that served as the home for smaller programs which did not fit neatly within the broader disciplines available at the time. At the time, these programs included Computer Science, Environmental Studies, and Health Policy. The unit was a source of professional disagreement for Dr. Wilson and fellow administrator, Gene Arden, who had created the division. Wilson explains that the programs would have been too small to be sustained if they were isolated as their own division instead of becoming part of the closest related department.

Keywords: Gene Arden; Interdisciplinary studies; Joe Cepuran; Marilynn Rosenthal; Orin Gelderloos; Professional disagreements; Division of Interdisciplinary Studies

Subjects: Universities and colleges--Faculty; Universities and colleges--United States--Departments; Interdisciplinary studies

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: So I was looking at it as U of M-Dearborn was now a mature institution, and we could think about the ways in which academic support was subordinate to academic policy and curriculum, but supportive of it. And that was the reason, in my own empathy, the reorganization should not leave some of those functions out.

Segment Synopsis: Blenda Wilson discusses the reorganization of Student Affairs that occurred during her term. She felt that bringing together various student-supporting units, including enrollment, advising, financial aid, etc., would help re-center the student within the university structure and provide a more updated administrative structure that better fit UM-Dearoborn as an established campus.

Keywords: Student Affairs; Student support in Universities; University administrative structure; Vice President of Academic Affairs; academic experience; organizational restructuring; University administration

Subjects: Student affairs services--Administration; Universities and colleges--Administration; Universities and colleges--United States--Departments--Administration

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: I create councils and forums and things like that.
ELTON HIGGS: That has continued.
BLENDA WILSON: Oh, that’s great! That is very good! Yeah, it was to say everything isn’t hierarchical, because if we’re all trying to achieve something, somehow we need to share what we know about how we get there.

Segment Synopsis: One of Blenda Wilson's many contributions to the campus was the creation of advisory councils across the university. The councils helped strengthen relationships and dialogue between the senior administration and other units on campus. During her time as Chancellor, Dr. Wilson started the Provost's Council, the Policy Council, and the Leadership Council. As of the recording of the interview, the Leadership Council was still used by campus administration.

Keywords: Advisory councils; Campus administration; Leadership Council; Policy Council; Provost's Council; University administrators

Subjects: Universities and colleges--United States--Planning; Universities and colleges--United States--Administration--Decision making

Partial Transcript: BLENDA WILSON: Yes. I think traditional campuses prefer to traditionally prepared faculty, and presidents, for that matter, too. The belief always is that if you haven’t gone up the traditional faculty route you don’t understand teaching and research. I don’t believe it, but I understand it.

Segment Synopsis: Blenda Wilson talks about how her extroverted personality, professional background, and administrative style were different than her predecessors. Dr. Wilson also elaborates on the impact of her background as an administrator by profession, rather than a faculty member-turned-administrator like previous chancellors. She also talks about the meaning of President and Chancellor roles as an external face for the campus and liaison between the university and funding organizations.

Keywords: Administration and Faculty Relations; Gene Arden; Lee Bollinger; Leonard E. Goodall; Professional background; Univeristy and Legislature Relations; University Chancellor; University President; University of Michigan-Dearborn Chancellors; William A. Jenkins; University administrators

Subjects: Universities and colleges--United States--Faculty--Attitudes; Universities and colleges--United States--Administration