Right Man, Right Job, Right Time

A Rare Confluence Of Talent, Need And Opportunity

I won't go into all of Sean Burrage's educational and previous job qualifications for the chancellor's position. They are well covered in the attached NonDoc article.

What I want to speak to is Sean's personal qualities and strengths. He is smart, soft spoken, thoughtful, considerate, a good listener, well qualified and determined to do a good job by being a great listener, facilitator, big thinker and inclusive of differing voices and opinions.

He'll need all those attributes and more. Higher education, our state's most important economic engine, has problems, some of its own making, others by an indifferent governor and Legislature.

Proof of that statement is the fact that student enrollment is down about 15% as measured over the last six to seven years. Cameron, East Central and Central Oklahoma in Edmond have suffered the deepest reductions while OSU and especially OU have either remained steady or had small increases.

Only recently has the Legislature reversed the decade long cuts to higher education with the overall budget dropping from slightly more than $1 billion appropriations in 2006 to about $800 million in the early Stitt years which reflects a debilitating 20% whack.

Also, capital funding – infrastructure, technology, internet, routine and special maintenance – has been ignored since the last major bond issue for such needs passed way back in 2005.

Our system of 27 colleges and universities, plus many specialty facilities and campuses, are crying out for leadership and, now due to our higher regents, a new chancellor will soon take the helm. He will do the hard work necessary to right this massive ship and the sooner he does, the better.

Good luck, friend. You'll need it.