Board of Trustees to get details on Plan for Pitt at meeting next week

By SUSAN JONES

The Pitt Board of Trustees will have its quarterly meeting at 10 a.m. June 25, and one topic scheduled to be discussed is the updated Plan for Pitt.

draft framework of the 2025 Plan for Pitt was released in April, and Pitt community members were asked to provide more feedback through a short survey.

Chancellor Patrick Gallagher will present the resulting plan — which has been in the works since 2019 and was slightly delayed because of the pandemic — at the upcoming board meeting.  The plan groups its goals under three specific areas:

  • How are we enabling students, faculty and staff to thrive?

  • How are we achieving excellence in our academic and research programs?

  • How are we changing lives for the better?

The meeting will once again be online only, with a livestream available via YouTube.

Board committees

Three committees of the board held public meetings in the past two weeks:

Investment Committee: Members voted unanimously on June 10 to keep the distribution percentages of funds taken from Pitt’s consolidated investment fund and University operating funds quasi-endowment the same for 2021-22 as the previous two years —  4.25 and 4.75 percent, respectively, of the three-year average fair market value. The distribution rates on both funds were increased to their current level in 2019 to help pay for the Pitt Success program.

Governance & Nominating Committee: A measure that would amend the bylaws to allow a school or regional campus to petition the provost to extend tenure clock to 10 years was approved by the committee on June 18 and will go to the full board next week. The change was endorsed by Provost Ann Cudd and Anantha Shekhar, senior vice chancellor for Health Sciences, and recommended by the Promotion & Tenure Ad Hoc Committee in 2019. The committee also voted to nominate three officers for re-election: Thomas Richards, chairman; and Mary Ellen Callahan and Lou Costello as vice chairpersons. Eva Tansky Blum, former board chair, also was nominated to serve as University director to the UPMC Board of Directors. Three people were nominated as new trustees — Madji Abulaban, CEO of Superior Industries; Hui Debra Cen, founder of inKynd by ImpactGoGo; and Bryan Saleksy, CEO of Argo AI.

Property & Facilities Committee: The committee approved construction projects at Hillman Library and a new chilled water plant and distribution system on the Upper Campus, and voted to acquire property at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Halket Street and 12 parcels parcels bounded by Bates Street, Boulevard of the Allies, and Zulema Street. (See related story here.)

Susan Jones is editor of the University Times. Reach her at suejones@pitt.edu or 724-244-4042.

 

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