Economic Summit II - Remarks and Speeches

Wisconsin's Economy at the Crossroads:
Building Higher Paying Jobs for the Future

November 26-27, 2001
Midwest Express Center, Milwaukee

Summit Closing:
Wisconsin's Economy at the Crossroads
UW System President Katharine C. Lyall
November 27, 2001

It has been a stimulating two days. We've heard a lot of thoughtful presentations and I think we all have a clearer picture of what's being done to move Wisconsin's economy forward.

In bringing this summit to a close, I want to start by thanking the many people who have been involved:

Governor McCallum
Lt. Governor Farrow
Representatives Green and Barrett
Senators Chvala and Panzer
Representatives Jensen and Black
Our moderator, Tom Still
Our dynamic keynote speaker, Dan Burrus
Our panelists and moderators
Our regional chairs and teams
Our white paper authors
Our student ambassadors who helped out today
The media who covered this summit
And all of you who came to listen and participate

I want to extend special recognition and thanks to those who helped make this summit happen:

Our summit coordinator, Laurie Dies
UW-Milwaukee's Outreach Division
Our executive committee
Our steering committee
Our UW Chancellors
Our UW Regents
And our University Relations staff

We are also extremely grateful to our summit sponsors:

M&I Bank
Firstar
Bank One
Associated Bank
Johnson Bank
Widget Source, and
The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
And the many other banks that joined in with sponsorship of this year's summit
And thanks to last year's summit sponsors who helped us start this statewide conversation.

One of the objectives that Jay laid out in opening this year's summit was to extract some specific commitments from the private and public sectors to further the state's economic growth and prosperity.

As you know, at last year's summit the University of Wisconsin System made four very specific commitments and we have made progress on all four:

To create a PK-16 council.
We have created a voluntary, statewide PK-16 Council in partnership with the Department of Public Instruction, the Wisconsin Technical College system, Wisconsin's private colleges and other organizations that have stakes in a seamless and high performing educational system. Our chief agenda item for the year ahead is teacher preparation.
To address the brain drain problem.
We have taken a step toward increasing the percentage of college graduates in the state by targeting improved graduation rates on our campuses and by enrolling 1800 additional students in high tech, high demand fields. We will enroll 700 more students in these fields next fall.
To seek more federal funding.
We have reallocated internal resources to go after more federal funding for the university and to better coordinate federal relations among our 15 institutions. We have formed a Federal Relations Council and I am pleased to report that federal funding for university programs is up $70 million over the past year.
To foster economic development efforts throughout the state.
With support from the governor and legislature and through our own reallocation, we are investing $62 million in programs to stimulate the state's economy. Every campus is working with its local communities on economic development initiatives. We are expanding our small business development centers across the state. We are creating new degree programs in high demand fields and areas, including a new engineering program in the Fox Valley through the auspices of UW Platteville and UW Fox Valley.

I especially want to thank our Chancellors who have spent many hours of their time on these initiatives during the past year. We appreciate their dedication and the concrete results that these programs are yielding.

In short, we have done a lot. But there is more that we can and will do - so for next year I want to dedicate our university efforts in four areas:

Regional Economic Development.
Our campuses and UW-Extension will continue to encourage and support their regional and community partnerships. As you have heard, from Milwaukee, the Fox Valley, Kenosha, Superior, La Crosse and elsewhere, there are exciting new regional initiatives under way. In this next phase, we will seek to engage more students in these activities and in service learning in our communities. There is nothing like learning by doing!
We will help advance the cluster approach by stimulating more partnerships with our faculty and staff who have pertinent special expertise. And we will work with our campuses and GMC to explore the concept of a new medical research incubator along I-94, anchored by GE Medical Systems, as part of a new Milwaukee-Madison-Chicago economic Triangle.
Brain Drain.
We will respond to the Governor by creating a statewide jobs network - Wisconsin Jobs for Wisconsin Grads - to market job opportunities in Wisconsin to our students and alumni. And we will develop programs to bring home alumni and their children who want to learn and settle in Wisconsin.
Our "Return to Wisconsin" package will include more robust marketing of Wisconsin job opportunities to our alumni, and tuition incentives for the children of alumni to return and attend UW campuses.
Federal Dollars.
We will strengthen our efforts to bring federal money to Wisconsin by working with the state and our federal delegation to create a Federal Center for science or technology in Wisconsin. As Congressman Green said: we have an opportunity to make Wisconsin a focus for technology research and technology transfer. And, we will collaborate with the state and private sectors to obtain Wisconsin's fair share of funding and jobs that may become available through the federal economic stimulus package.
We will also work with our Congressional delegation to host a series of Wisconsin Idea Forums on issues of national importance throughout the state to give Wisconsin more national visibility; and to raise consciousness of federal opportunities like those described by Congressman Barrett. And in January, we will brief our delegation on the outcomes of this summit.
Faculty & Alumni Involvement.
We will make UW faculty and staff expertise more available to assist the state's economic development strategy by creating a cadre of Wisconsin Idea Fellows - faculty and staff who will be given release time to work on important state priorities, such as Congressman Green's paper institute idea. At the same time, we will create a Corporate Advisory Board involving alumni from around the nation and around the world to work with us on growing Wisconsin's economy and recruiting new businesses here.

We make these commitments in the spirit of the Wisconsin Idea - that the boundaries of the university extend to the boundaries of the state - and in this era, to the boundaries of the world. As Lt. Governor Farrow reminded us, there are many more steps that need to be taken by all of us at this conference, as Jay Smith will describe.

So, now I would like to turn the microphone back to Regent President Jay L. Smith and thank him for his strong leadership over the past two years in getting us all to think hard about Wisconsin's economic future. He is the motivating force of this summit and he has helped make the university a much stronger partner with government and the private sector in stimulating the state economy. Thank you, Jay.