Southeastern Massachusetts University - Scrimshaw Yearbook (North Dartmouth, MA)

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1 W f r iw W i Or . 5 -1559, JF: I understand you went to the Theatre Company Box Office to pick up tickets for their recent production and they asked who you were. This must be disconcerting, not having people know who you are. WALKER: Not really. lt's normal in any large organization for Presidents to be relatively unknown. The thing I regret about it is that I don't have time to get out and meet more students individually although I do meet a surprising number. But no, it doesn't distress me at all. I think the job of the President is to get things done, to create a climate on a campus where the juices can flow, because there is a great deal of innovative wit on the campus. The job of the President is not to do a grandstand show and have people marvel at the wonder of his presence, but rather to create a climate in which everyone participates, everyone shares the credit, everyone takes the bows, everyone wins the solutions, as well as the problems, and I think a relatively low profile, where ego needs are subordinated to the chemistry of the institution, is a style that I prefer and try to cultivate. The bad part of that is since l'm a Touch administrator andlike to move around and see people and like people, l'm frequently deprived of that. Now, I do have stand-up appointments once a week where students can come in with anything on their mind, but I must say that I get surprisingly few takers. JF: Well, why don't you tell us something about yourself. I understand, for instance, that you write mystery novels. WALKER: Yes, that is something that I do between midnight and the time I go to bed. I do like detective literature, I think it's a much more subtle form of literature, a genre that's sometimes neglected because the characters tend to be plastic, unreal characters, as they are not novels of personal development and character deliniation, although some detective writers do that S rs ' I rather well. I like the structure of the detective novel. People sometimes ask me whery I came by this morbid interest...but it isn't morbid! The detective novel is the modern morality play. People move in and out of a matrix of law and due process. I agree with G.K. Chesterton: People who don't like detective stories are anarchists! JF: Do you get ideas from everyday life or is this a totally different world? WALKER: lt's a totally different world, and you shouIdn't ask a detective story to reflect life, any more than you should ask the ballet to reflect life. Real murder is ugly, and usually quite simple. Eighty-five percent of the people who are murdered know their killer. lt's your friends that do you in. JF: You're a real student of human nature. Seriously, have you a degree in Psychology? ' WALKER: l'm a sociologist in poor repair. JF: How long have you been at SIVIU? WALKER: This is finishing up my third year, coming around into the turn. JF: What changes have you seen since you first came here? WALKER: lt's hard to tell, exactly. I hope the self-image of the Univeristy is improving. This is a first-rate teaching university. l've noticed some tendency to suffer from what Chopin referred to as EngIishman's Disease. Chopin complained that the Englishman tended to play the good notes with indifference and the bad notes with great feeling., I think to some extent that applied to the academic community when I arrived: it is less so now. I think that more creative things are going on - they tend to be invisible - but if you look at the number of new programs that have been instituted in the last few years - and not by me - they indicate a better, more concerned climate. I think the University has improved its position in the state tremendously because legislators have become more aware of what an excellent institution this is. There has been considerable improvement in our budget

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situation, whereas three years ago we were starving to death, financially. We still have very real problems, but things are improving. I've noticed SMU is becoming more of a center and resource, in the best sense, for a University for this part of the Commonwealth. We are serving the community in more realistic ways. JF: What changes have you seen in the attitude of the students? WALKER: I think the students here are a remarkable group. I think they are much more articulate, much more informed, much more aware of the University's general problems than any campus of which I have been aware. I don't know the reason for this. I don't know that I have noticed any particular change, except that the deep concern that students have for this University has become very apparent in the budget issue. I don't know that this represents a change, I think it was always there, it is just now being expressed in constructive ways that are noticable .... Well, why dontcha ask me what I hope to do at SMU? JF: Alright, what do you hope to do at SMU? WALKER: Okay, it seems to me we've got a couple of goals here at SMU. One we'II call institutional goals. We conducted a poll of the constuencies inside and outside the University to see what people expected SMU to be. Interestingly enough, what our constituents expect us to be inside and outside the University is not primarily a teaching University but a full-purpose, full-range community-oriented University. Those are the goals that we pursue. I don't think a University President can come in with a blueprint and cut off the parts that don't fit. I think a University is an organic, growing - if you'II permit me to be metaphorical - living organism that must be sensitively managed. Some one once said no one should tamper with Universities that does not know them or love them. My father and his father before him were both university professors. I have a deep affection for universities. JF: It runs in the family. .xg X Q r' F M WALKER: It runs in the family. That is one type of goal, there is another kind of goal I hope we can serve at SMU - a kink of process goal, the way we make decisions. We talk about democracy in universities. most Universities are not nearly democratic enough, though they are more democratic than, say, most business organizations. What we are trying to do here is get people involved in making decisions who are going to be affected by those decisions...to maintain a totally open communicative style Now, it's hard going, because there are people here who bear deep scars, and we spend a good deal of time treating one another for paranoia. But basically, I see the climate of trust growing, at least in this building and to some extent among the students and faculty. It takes a great deal of time. But one of the things I hope we can do is innovate by getting more people involved in decision-making, by decentralising authority, and at the same time getting things done, so that decisions don't wait for a consensus to emerge. The way administrators do that is by maintaining a relatively low profile and by getting the juices flowing in other people and maintaining a high profile outside the institution acting as ambassador for the University to the community. JF: How about your personal goals? Would you like to see your mystery novels published? Or, have you already had material published? WALKER: I have had a science-fiction story published in a literary magazine: I have not yet published a mystery story, but yes, I certainly would like to have one of those published, and I have one that I think will be published. JF: Any last words? WALKER: Go, and send no more.