University of Southern California - El Rodeo Yearbook (Los Angeles, CA)

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I iiboMillionExpansionOnUSCCampusPlani USC Charts Dynamic Future

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PFlFf according to a MASTER PLAN . . . L

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USC: A Bid for Excellence A hush settled over the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel that night of May 17, 1961, as President Norman Topping slowly walked to the podium. Almost 1,000 black-tie guests were supremely aware of the significance of the moment — rumors had been circulating for weeks that the future of the University of Southern California would be unveiled that evening. Alumni and friends of the university had flown in from as far as San Francisco, Phoenix, Fresno and San Diego to be present, and the program at the USC Associates- sponsored dinner seemed to drag on interminably as the assembly waited for Dr. Topping to speak. At tables scattered across the room, members of a blue rib- bon committee headed by H. Leslie Hoffman waited ex- pectantly to hear the results of the in-depth study of the university they had taken two and a half years to complete. At other tables, members of a committee that had spent two months planning the minutest detail of this dinner watched their plans materialize without a flaw. Leonard K. Firestone, chairman of the Board of Trustees, who had just presented the USC Associates $1,000 Awards to eight faculty members for teaching excellence, sat back to watch the President; Dr. Frank C. Baxter, then professor of English, had just concluded his address to the assem- bly and turned the podium over to Dr. Topping. Each of us tonight, Dr. Topping said, is acutely aware of how profound is the nation ' s concern for education in the years ahead — indeed, for the entire future of edu- cation in this country. This concern is based partly upon the burgeoning enrollments and the shortage of pro- fessors which we face at this very moment. But the na- tion ' s concern is also an expression of deep human needs. The human needs for understanding, justice, for freedom and for survival have been made critical by the status symbol of an atomic age: the power to destroy the life upon the only planet known to support human life. We, as a nation, justifiably hope to be assured that our great institutions of higher learning will provide the leaders we need, now and throughout the future, who will reassert the supremacy of the traditional symbols of civilized human status: government with wisdom, the perpetual maintenance of free institutions, research for a better life, and life in peace with all our fellow men. Where then, but from the nation ' s colleges and uni- versities will come the fully-educated men who are free from ignorance, intolerance and secularism — the men who are the leaders we seek? And how, but by con- centrating on quality in scholarship, can any university assure leaders of quality to the community, to the nations and to all mankind? The University of Southern California ' s answer to these questions is the only proper answer. All our faculty, all our trustees, all our administration have agreed that our mission must be, exclusively, to assure excellence in ed- ucation — to pursue excellence only with those scholars who show definite promise of attaining it — to pursue excellence, with vigor and without compromise, as long as we can lead bright young minds along the path to truth. The President detailed the long months of extensive study that had gone into the formulation of the university ' s future plans. Together we have reviewed the substance of all great universities; together we have studied a multitude of re- ports and recommendations. Together we have formu- lated precisely the plan we need. With this plan to guide