IUPUI Signature Centers To Enable Faculty Academic Dreams To Come True

IUPUI Executive Vice Chancellor and Dean of the Faculties, Uday Sukhatme

INDIANAPOLIS – As the process of assembling an academic plan moves forward, Uday Sukhatme, IUPUI Executive Vice Chancellor and Dean of the Faculties, knows what should be at the heart of that document: signature centers.

And he knows from experience what the creation and support of a substantial number of signature centers will do. They will unleash, he says, the academic dreams and excitement of faculty who will generate ideas that will bring more distinction to IUPUI.

“These centers will be the shining centerpiece of the academic plan, taking IUPUI's strong research profile to a significantly higher level,” Sukhatme said. “There is every reason to expect that an attractive academic plan will be of considerable interest to donors as we embark on a fundraising campaign next year.”

A signature center, he explained, is a research unit distinctly identifiable with IUPUI. In addition to representing an area of research strength, the center will usually build on some ongoing activities and have many of the following attributes:

• Signature centers will often be interdisciplinary in character. They should have the capacity to attract significant external funding as appropriate to the disciplines involved, including federal grants and foundation support. The centers need to bring academic distinction to the campus. After an initial period of campus-based seed funding, they should become largely self-sufficient in a 3 to 5 year time frame.
• The work of the center should have something unique and distinctive, which makes it stand out. It should not focus on an area commonly studied at many other universities, although collaborations with other institutions could be a desirable feature.
• The center should engage in work which takes advantage of the urban location in Indianapolis and establish partnerships with local community and cultural organizations.

At present, IUPUI has numerous existing centers and institutes engaged in a wide variety of activities, he noted. Some already possess the attributes of signature centers described above. These centers may nevertheless wish to submit proposals with plans to further expand the scope of their activities. Yet other centers, created in years past with high hopes but few resources, may wish to write proposals with specific plans to take them to signature status.

“For most faculty, this request for proposals is really a call encouraging them to dream, to let their imagination soar, and conceive of new collaborations and directions which are perhaps risky, but hold the elements of developing into signature centers,” he said.

As Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences at the State University of New York at Buffalo, Sukhatme oversaw the creation of 15 signature centers, selected from among 40 proposals that were originally submitted.

When he began that process, Sukhatme said he expected available funding would support nine or ten signature centers. The college’s development officers, however, were able to raise additional funds, enabling more centers to be created. “Donors were interested because they could clearly see what their money was buying,” he said.

Sukhatme said he anticipates each of the signature centers selected at IUPUI will receive $200,000 to $300,000 in funding spread out over a three year period, with the cost to be shared equally between the central administration and decanal units. The work of the centers would then be evaluated in three years to assess what they’ve accomplished.

Signature center proposals will be evaluated by the schools of faculty submitting them before being reviewed by a university-wide committee. It is expected that the signature centers to be created at IUPUI will be announced in January 2007.