Earlier this week, a group of five former FAMU presidents released
the following open letter in response to a legislative proposal to divide the
FAMU-FSU College of Engineering:
As former leaders of Florida A&M University, we oppose
the move to decouple the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering and consider this a
sudden and unplanned act, void of discussion and input from the current
leadership of the two universities, the university Boards of Trustees and the
Florida Board of Governors. This action sends the wrong message to the citizens
of Florida, and other interested parties, about how the Legislature and
academic institutions should interact.
The FAMU-FSU College of Engineering is a strong program that
represents a successful collaboration for the State of Florida between two
research institutions with elements of their student populations woefully
underrepresented in engineering disciplines. Through this long-term
collaborative effort, the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering has received high
praise for addressing this nationwide dilemma.
A second program in Tallahassee would compromise the integrity of what is already a very successful venture. Furthermore, one can only look to our sister university, Florida Polytechnic University, to see how expensive it is to support a stand-alone engineering program in today's economy. In fact, a major focus of the Florida Board of Governors over the past few years has been a concerted effort to reduce duplication of academic programs throughout the State University System.
Proposing such a drastic change without any obvious
consideration or discussion of the above factors is surprising and not in the
best interest of our State University System or the citizens of Florida. As an
alternative, we request that the Legislature provide additional support to our
existing program, which has produced successful graduates for both Florida
A&M University and Florida State University since 1982.
With all due respect to the power and authority of the
Legislature to appropriate funding, we respectfully request engagement in a
collaborative process to include both academic institutions and our governing
bodies to determine how such funding will be used to build on our past
successes. We are pleased to work transparently within appropriate guidelines
and authorities to create life-changing opportunities for students in Florida
to pursue a quality education in engineering through the joint engineering
program.
Sincerely,
Walter Smith, Ph.D. (President 1977-1985)
Frederick Humphries, Ph.D. (President 1985-2001)
Fred Gainous, Ph.D. (President 2002-2004)
James Ammons, Ph.D. (President 2007-2012)
Larry Robinson, Ph.D. (Interim President 2012-2014)