In 2000, former Gov. Mike Leavitt "rolled out a plan with a vision for the future."
And, according to Marilyn Davies, an official in the College of Engineering, the U is one of the handful of schools across the state who have met Leavitt's challenge.
Leavitt introduced his "engineering initiative" in his State of the State address, promising to increase each schools' engineering budget by 50 percent if they doubled their number of engineering graduates.
Davies said the number of new engineering majors has increased by 32 percent in the last two years at the U, and the number should be doubled soon. Before the initiative, "there was a limited number of resources and therefore a limit to the number of students we could take," Davies said.
"The students were there, we just couldn't take them all," she said.
Now, after meeting their part of the deal, U officials hope the state will fulfill Leavitt's promise to increase funds. So far, the U has more than matched the state's contributions of $1.4 million by adding another $1.9 million to the budget.
The money will be used to support the college's teaching assistants and to hire more faculty, according to Davies.
She said that state Legislature needs to look at the benefit the college provides for the state's economy. "We need to grow the tax base in order to support the growing population," she said.
In order to do that, the state needs "a supply of highly skilled, highly qualified engineers and computer scientists," Davies said.
Of equal importance, she said, is to remember that colleges and universities across Utah are affected by the initiative, not just the U.
Engineering departments, Davies said, are directly connected to economic development, and therefore "tied to Utah's economy."
Legislators are also faced with the U's request for $45 million to fund the renovation of Marriott Library. The Utah Seismic Safety Commission unanimously agreed on Jan. 16 to support the request after hearing evidence that an earthquake could cause fatalities in the structurally unsound library.
Davies had a message for the Legislature. "If you look at the future of the state...we have to think of things to invest in for the future. If the state doesn't invest in technology, what else is there?"
cwieser@chronicle.utah.edu
