PRESIDENT RUNTE ALLOCATES $3 MILLION FOR FACULTY

Old Dominion will add more than $3 million in new faculty positions over the next two years, President Roseann Runte announced this week.

The positions will be used to address deficiencies in certain curriculum areas and to stimulate research activity.

"Significantly increasing the number of faculty will allow us to offer additional courses in areas where there is an interest, to do more research and to fill certain gaps in our existing areas of research expertise," said Runte.

Provost Thomas Isenhour and Mohammad Karim, ODU's new vice president for research, are using university and national data to determine how these additional personnel can have the greatest impact on the university.

"This is very exciting," Isenhour said. "ODU has committed to becoming one of the top 100 public research universities in the United States. These faculty additions will be a first step toward achieving that goal."

The initiative is being funded by Old Dominion's 2004-06 biennial budget allocation from the General Assembly. The university received $18 million for the two-year period, the second-highest allocation of additional funding among state colleges and universities, to support base operating budgets and enrollment growth.

Runte said she has also set aside $1 million this fiscal year to address merit pay, retention and compression issues among faculty, administrators and classified staff, and that additional funds will be set aside for future years until all issues are resolved.

She noted that her goals in utilizing ODU's allocation of state "base adequacy" funds are to address salary issues, hire additional faculty, provide more student scholarships and on-campus jobs, and offer additional graduate stipends and fellowships.

"We have to move ahead with the faculty piece of this immediately," she said. "This is the base piece that is needed. When we have have the new faculty, we will also have a base to attract more research grants."