For the third day in a row, the Cal Poly campus hosted a potential candidate to replace President Warren Baker next year. The final visitor was Dr. Steven R. Angle, who addressed students, faculty, alumni, administrators and San Luis Obispo community members at three different forums yesterday.
Angle, whose degrees are all in chemistry, said he first became interested in Cal Poly when he served as the dean of the College of Natural and Agricultural Sciences at the University of California, Riverside (UCR). He said the wide variety of programs at Cal Poly intrigued him, especially in the agricultural sector.
“The portfolio of programs that Cal Poly has to offer and the fact that agriculture is part of that interested me,” Angle said. “I really enjoyed working with the ag industry and the problems and issues of agriculture when I was a dean at UC Riverside.”
Angle answered questions ranging from the budget issues facing Cal Poly to campus diversity and maintaining the university’s status as the premiere institution among the other California State University campuses. He said he sensed an enthusiasm and excitement from the entire campus community when he walked around today. Angle said there was a fear and trepidation due to budget concerns, but also a realization that Cal Poly was a special place with great things ahead of it.
“Cal Poly is going to excel,” Angle said. “The students will excel, so it’s the sense of care and passion for the institution and for the impact on the students that I took away that I feel like, ‘Wow, this is a place I can really identify with that shares the sense of values I have.'”
He said students all learn differently and the “learn by doing” mentality allows students the time to grapple with concepts and find out what they truly mean.
“Some of us get things in different ways and ‘learn by doing’ allows you to approach difficult concepts from the back door and a different way,” Angle said. “It’s one thing to regurgitate facts; it’s another to apply knowledge to problems and learn by doing is about applying knowledge to problems. That’s what industry wants and that’s why Cal Poly graduates are sought after and that’s something I believe we need to sustain.”
Industrial engineering senior Chester Matkey was one of the attendees who was glad to hear Angle’s emphasis on hands-on learning.
“I think that was really critical and that’s what our school is all about,” Matkey said. “That’s why we all decided to come here; we want that hands-on learning.”
Matkey also said Angle was very personable and related well with those in attendance.
“He’s definitely all about building relationships, partnerships, friendships to help benefit the university,” Matkey said. “That seemed like a really important key for the president to be a team player, a team leader to bring together those groups to make things happen.”
Despite the lack of student attendance at the forums, there seemed to be an engaged few concerned about the future of the university. Philip Bailey, dean of the College of Science and Mathematics, said there were probably about 30 or 40 students out of 20,000 who attended the forums.
“I think the students who have come are people who are more connected with the university,” Bailey said. “The ones that were at the forums asked questions that were very important to the future of our university.”
Bailey said the students and faculty are looking for a candidate to enhance the value of the degrees that Cal Poly students obtain. Also, he said Cal Poly needs to remain one of the best universities in the country.
“I tell faculty members when we interview them how far we’ve come since I came here in 1969 and we need to be the premiere undergraduate polytechnic university in the country,” Bailey said. “We want (students’) degree 30 years from now to be worth more than it is today and that’s what students, the faculty and the staff are looking for.”
In concluding his talks, Angle talked about the difficulties in facing change, but the university also has an opportunity for the future.
“We’re all in the same boat and we’re all going through change,” Angle said. “If we do it together, it’s much more manageable and understanding that we have a lot to learn from each other.”