Address to the Board of
Trustees of
The University of Alabama
System
Robert W. McDonald, UAB
Student Representative
February 2, 2007
Board of Trustees Remarks
Good
Morning,
Chancellor
Portera, Members of the Board of Trustees, Presidents, and Distinguished
Guests, my name is Rob McDonald. I am a third year student in the UAB
School of Medicine. I am honored to serve as the UAB student
representative to the Board of Trustees, and I am grateful for the
opportunity to address you today.
I would
like to present to you my views of the advances that UAB has been making
as a leading institution of higher learning within Alabama. I want to
caution you that my being a medical student keeps my focus fairly narrow
with regard to the campus as a whole. On the other hand, I have been
involved with UAB for nearly 12 years, first as a student, then as an
employee, and now again as a student. To broaden my views, I sought the
counsel of SGA Presidents from undergraduate and graduate programs at
UAB. I want to give them credit, especially to Mr. Andrew Brashier, who
is the Undergraduate SGA President, for their assistance in forming my
comments today.
Overall I
have seen the University of Alabama at Birmingham grow tremendously in
the last 12 years. While I can not count the number of buildings that
have come down or gone up, I can say, in broad strokes, that the campus
has much more of an on-campus feel than it did when I first arrived in
1995. That is to say, I get the sense that more students live on and
are involved with the campus. There are certainly more residence
halls, an improved recreation facility, and improved on-campus dining
options – developments that have come on in the last year or two. My
perception of a “more on-campus feel” are born out by the numbers: over
1,600 undergraduate students lived on campus last year, an increase of
20% since 2003. I get more of a sense of unity on campus than I did when
I first arrived here. There is more foot-traffic. There are more events
organized for students on campus, like the 6th Annual
International Bazaar that occurred last week. Attendance for Men’s
basketball games, a safe walk from UAB residence halls, has increased
50% in the last three years. These examples lead me to believe that the
UAB campus is becoming a more traditional campus, which I think makes it
an increasing attractive option to potential undergraduate students.
You heard
me say “a safe walk” a moment ago. Student Services makes a point of
performing semi-annual surveys of all 80+ blocks of the UAB campus –
after dark – for adequate lighting and operational safety call boxes.
These surveys are conducted with students, and in 2006, they also
included someone from the city council. Thus the students who know the
most traveled routes are involved and can voice their concerns. The city
representative was there to hear about any deficits in lighting that
falls under city purview. I think the lighting survey represents an
exemplary cooperative effort between administration (including the UAB
police department), students, and the city.
The UAB
Campus Recreation Center is one of only nine centers to be recognized in
2006 as an Outstanding Sports Facility by the National
Intramural–Recreational Sports Association. Centrally located on campus,
the Campus Recreation Center is equally available from all four corners
of the UAB campus. Its hours are amenable to getting a work-out in
before work, before class, or after a long day of studying. And
inside…it’s the get-in-shape equivalent of Christmas morning.
Rock-climbing. Pools with a vortex. Weights. Machines. Table tennis.
Bikes and ellipticals with TVs. Can you tell that I grew up in the 80s
if I say “Aerobics classes” instead of “Spin classes?” Basketball and
volleyball. Indoor soccer. Racquetball. Steam rooms. Showers with
excellent water pressure. The Campus Recreation Center is an overall A+.
Switching
gears…
Due to the
Mervyn H. Sterne and Lister Hill Libraries, I have never had trouble
finding a quiet place to study on campus, over and above the outstanding
facilities of the School of Medicine in Volker Hall. I still need and
use quiet study carrels for reading. That is, the age of the Internet
has not made the physical space of libraries obsolete. However, the
highlight of the libraries, in my view, is online access to
materials – particularly scientific research articles and complete
medical texts – that these libraries provide. Making online access to
materials available, through purchased University-wide subscriptions and
licensures, has facilitated my educational experiences at UAB. We
students appreciate the Board’s past support for these sorts of
expenditures and we will benefit greatly from your continued support in
this regard.
These
highlights – increased campus housing, the Rec Center, the libraries,
the feeling of becoming a campus with tradition – are complemented by an
increase in the academic achievements of the UAB student body. For
example, the average ACT score for incoming freshmen is now over 23,
trending upward and exceeding the benchmark set forth in the UAB
Strategic Plan.
I am
pleased that UAB is increasing efforts to encourage students to study
abroad, including allocating additional funds for scholarships. I am of
the opinion that traveling the world broadens one’s educational
experience, allows one to have a deeper perspective of the meaning of
one’s life, and would be a major benefit for the students of UAB. The
Strategic Plan has benchmarks aimed at increasing the number of students
who participate in study abroad, and that is a worthwhile goal.
Now I
would like to transition into the intertwined realms of medicine and
research, areas where I am more familiar, and areas where UAB shines
most brightly. The research facilities on campus continue to advance the
definition of the term state of the art. The Richard C. and Annette N.
Shelby Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research Building is a 12-story
leviathan of state-of-the-art research space that increases the total
research space on campus by 25%. In my lifetime just prior to medical
school, I was the administrator for the UAB Center for AIDS Research.
Annually we had External Advisory committees visit and review our center
as part of an ongoing strategic planning process. Every year,
representatives from UC San Francisco, Harvard, Emory, and other
institutions evaluated us, and every year space was identified as one of
our key strengths. I think this is true of UAB as a whole, and perhaps
for all of the campuses within the UA System – we have space for
expansion that other leading institutions simply don’t have in their
densely packed cities. Moreover, UAB can continue to expand in a
contiguous fashion. I think the Shelby Building is an outstanding
example of optimal use of our space advantage.
The other
clear example of optimal expansion is the North Pavilion, known to we
medical students as “the new hospital.” This is the finest hospital
facility I have ever been in. I believe that it will be an attraction
not only for patients seeking the best tertiary medical care, but also
for prospective medical faculty and future generations of medical
students. The UAB Hospital received the 2005-2006 Consumer Choice Award
from the National Research Corporation – an award based on survey
results from the consumers, the customers, our patients – saying we are
among the best, in the top 10% of hospitals surveyed. The expanded
hospital facilities are a strong selling point for the Medical
institution within UAB.
I would
like to close by shedding some light on a true gem within the University
of Alabama at Birmingham. It involves AIDS – the global epidemic that
kills 3 million people annually and captures 5 million new victims each
year. UAB has been at the leading edge of HIV research and care since
the 1980s, led by a core group of leaders who had the foresight to
prioritize this problem from its earliest days. I would be equally
justified to speak about other fields in which UAB leads, like Heart
Failure, Cancer, or Biodefense, but today I will talk about AIDS.
UAB
continues to be a leader in AIDS care, having been ranked consistently
in the top 5 in the nation for AIDS care by US News & World Report. You
may be familiar with that mark. What you may not be familiar with is
that when President Bush committed 15 Billion over 5 years to fifteen
countries for AIDS prevention and treatment during his 2003 State of the
Union Address, he made a commitment to HIV in Zambia. UAB had already
been committed to Zambia with faculty working in care and clinical
research since 1997 there. The confluence of those two commitments has
led to some amazing events. As a result of UAB’s presence in Zambia and
the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, as it is
known, over 70,000 Zambians have enrolled in an HIV treatment program,
and over 20,000 have been placed on life-saving HIV treatment. To put
that 20,000 in perspective, in the 20+ years that HIV has been
recognized in Birmingham, approximately 10,000 have received treatment.
In Zambia, in clinics managed by Zambian doctors working alongside UAB
faculty, medical students, and hundreds of dedicated staff, thousands of
lives are being saved. Children are able to keep their mothers longer.
Families remain intact longer. Economic potential that had been lost to
disease is being restored.
This is a
rich cooperative effort between UAB, Federal agencies, and the Zambian
government. I believe that this effort should receive every support
possible to maintain it. I say this from personal experience, because I
have had opportunities to work in Zambia, both before treatment and
after. I have seen the difference with my own eyes, I have seen the
beauty of this country, and the horrible decimation that AIDS has
brought to it. I have also seen that with therapy, hard work, commitment
of people and resources, there is hope in a place where hope was in very
short supply. If it weren’t for folks at UAB, this may not have
happened. Period.
At the end
of our days, when we are at our sunset, and taking stock of our
accomplishments, we will look back at what we have done to make a
difference. We will have improved the education of future generations,
we will have learned more about science and medicine. And one of the
highlights that will shine through the years, I believe, will be UAB’s
role in turning the tide on the AIDS epidemic, particularly in Zambia.
I believe that this is a shining example of UAB’s potential being
realized today.
Thank you
again for the honor of addressing you this morning.
