New Gentile Center unveiling

[valpotx]

A fieldhouse was mentioned by Heckler when he was in TX, so hopefully that does happen!

In regards to campus improvements, I definitely approve of what has been going on around campus.  As long as after these much needed improvements are made we focus on some of the athletics shortfalls more, I will be happy.  I liked the baseball renovations performed while I was playing (clubhouse, better playing surface, etc) and since that time, as well as improvements for the other sports (softball, tennis, football, etc).  We can only commit so many resources to sports, and basketball has received improvements in practice courts, digital signage, and a few other things.  I am sure that a more intimate gameday environment will be in the plans, just a matter of when.

[VULB#62]

Let me tell you all a story.  Please read to the end.  I DO have a message.

It was 1962. I got off the NY-Chicago train in the Indiana town of Valparaiso from NY with a trunk, a suitcase and a 1/2 grant-in-aid for FB. I had applied and enrolled sight unseen -- heck, I was good old Luderan boy. As I was riding in the cab to Wehrenberg Hall on Laporte Ave the driver pointed out Brown Field - 'our college's FB field' - on my right. I can't tell you how disappointed I was. I had captained an undefeated HS team and played in front of large crowds and now I was going to play COLLEGE FB ----- here?  This was the era of limited substitution FB and frosh ineligible. I wound up starting as a sophomore as a G/LB on a Dave Lass QBed team that beat the likes of Indiana State, and, later in 1969, that same program won the Indiana Collegiate Conference FB title. I also threw the javelin for probably the greatest track team in VU history under Darrell Zimmerman, where we had to time our track meet events to ensure that a miler wasn't clocked by a line drive during a baseball game, because the loose cinder track ran through right field.  I came to love my experiences at Valpo despite, even then, lesser facilities.  Great memories.  And that's why I'm posting BTW.

So what's my message.  That VU can still be great despite inferior facilities?  Nope. 

The message is that 45 years ago we had a pretty subpar grandstand and we had a crappy track and ...... you know what? the view from Laporte Ave hasn't appreciably changed!  I stand corrected --  there's no track.

[sectionee]

So we are upset that someone has donated $15 million to a project that has major meaning to them but didn't give to athletics....that makes loads of sense.  Valpotx just said he does the same thing giving only to athletics (as others here probably do) and wouldn't give if they dropped sports (while I disagree with this attitude but it is his money to do with what he pleases), on a smaller level I assume...should the good folks in another department be upset?  He is right, VU can only commit so much to sports.  VU is not a sports first school, obviously.  You want to see a new building send in that multi-million dollar donation.  If you have the means, then step up and do something about it.

The tennis and football field were given improvements from that $240million campaign.

Also, UIC was probably able to accomplish the building of this facility in a recession because they have an enrollment nearly 6 times that of Valpo's. 

[DMvalpo18]

It is unfortunate that we don't have unlimited assets and endowment that can make a couple posters happy. We are a private university with a limited endowment. We had faciliteis and still do that are under competitive in major areas like residences, the Union classrooms, not just one of the newest buildings on campus the ARC. The Chapel was in bad need of repairs after over 50 years. It is the center of campus physically and mission-wise. The ARC itself is below today's standards for space utilization and revenue maximization. Everyone, that includes, the Board knows this, but unless you all who are so critical forgot we have been in a rescession for 3 years, and we have limited funds (and your willing to step up with $15 million), you just can't make $100 or $50 million available for a revamp immediately to meet the criticisms. The University recognizes it needs to revamp the main athletic facilities, including building a facility that meets the needs of most of the student body. There are studies to find the best solutions and the end result will be announced when it's time. You have read on this board the progress of that. Frankly, there are many on that Board who are some of the biggest supporters of Valpo athletics and Valpo basketball. Introduce yourself next time you're at a game or Homecoming or a Board weekend, or send them a thoughtful note. Just ripping them without engaging in dialogue about the conflicting priorities of a University is not productive.

Don't give me the recession excuse. We built a brand new engineering building recently. That was not cheap.

[sectionee]

DM you don't know what you are talking about here. That money was also raised by one very wealthy alum.

[vu72]

DM you don't know what you are talking about here. That money was also raised by one very wealthy alum.

sectionee hit it on the head.  Just flapping your lips without knowledge of the facts in nonproductive to say the least.  Don Fites put up the money for the Engineering addition.  He is a board member and former chairman of Catepillar.  When a fund drive is put in place people are asked what project they want to dedicate their contribution toward.  BTW, their was no "excess" money raised that was not earmarked for a given purpose.  In many cases those funds were given toward the endowment, which guarantees the future of the institution.

So. we can all look at high school facilities and I have one here not far from me at Eden Prairie High, who just won the big school state championship here in Minnesota.  Guess what?  They didn't raise funds for those facilities with donations.  It was done on the back of the tax payers.

I contribute what I can and specify either basketball or the Valpo Fund.  I may shift a little toward football as I think they are on the right track.  Give money toward a track.  If I had more I'd send some in for that purpose

[vu84v2]

I was an athlete on a team in the 80s (far from anything major and I was not very good).  That program has sent me specific mailings asking for targeted donations - so it is at least done inconsistently from the athletic department.

What team were you a part of?

I played golf.  Dick Fick was the coach.

[VULB#62]

I live in the northeast.  What I see here from multiple schools (both private and public) is focusing their alumni involvement. Science building? -- develop a program, target the donors and raise the $$; new library? -- develop a program.  Move to D-I ? -- build a stadium; etc. etc. 

Having been clueless for 40 some years about VU athletic fund raising (except for the periodic V-Club requests for help and the FITT thing a ways back), I ask this question: When have the resources of athletic alumni (600 out of 3800 each year? -- probably more than graduate annually with a degree in biology) been truly harnessed and focused on upgrading VU to D-I facility-wise?  All of our posts are good in that it raises our BP levels.  But the next step is necessary -- that raised attitude is needed to drive people together to raise the funds. 

But it appears that there is no one trying to harness this apparently large well of potential energy.  Is there anyone in the athletic department truly qualified to inventory and coordinate this energy and focus it in the direction I am hearing  all of us want it to go?

Here's what I'd like to see/hear:  "VU Alums! We are now a D-I University in all sports.  We have to complete the track around Brown Field and renovate the stands, adding 2000 seats, expanding the press box, and enclosing the field with a 6' berm and a steel/brick fence.  It will cost $x. This will make the football, men's and women's soccer and the men's and women's track and field programs D-I competitive. The total cost is $W and the university has invested $X to initiate this effort.  Ground is being broken in Y months.  But to finish this we need your help to pay for the rest of it and that will be $Z."

Similarly -- "In addition to the new scoreboard, the ARC needs upgrading.  We are installing really cool reserved seating and .... whatever (sorry, I don't know much about this). It will cost $X.  The construction begins in Y months and to complete this we need $Z from you to help to pay for it."

Truthfully, as an alumni of 45 years I have never been confronted with these kinds of challenges -- but I would welcome them. Why?  Because I'd know exactly where my $ is going and I would be able to follow the fund raising progress. FITT did not do it (for me at least).

I have great personal memories about my four years at Valpo.  But from 900 miles away, I have very few things that I can point to with PRIDE about my university (except, maybe, for Bryce's shot in the NCAA tourney) that I can share with people who didn't go to VU.  Right now all my friends here see are occasional BB wins on ESPN and a lot of lopsided losses (29 straight) in FB and BB (AU, OSU).  i'd like to find a way to participate in programs to change that. Maybe I'm just not on the right mailing lists and I certainly don't see much  mention of this type of thing in the alumni glossy publications.

[historyman]

I have not been to half of the facilities in the Horizon league for basketball, but I would argue confidently that the ARC is better than the old Mecca where UW-Milwaukee plays.  Bigger is not better.

Currently UWM has instituted a student fee ($20) that UWM has been collecting for over a year to help pay for a new on campus facility that would seat roughly what the ARC seats (5,000). Then if they can attract an opponent that would draw over 5,000 they could move the game to the U.S. Cellular Arena where they play their games now. At least they have a plan in place.

A fieldhouse was mentioned by Heckler when he was in TX, so hopefully that does happen!

These things are "mentioned" constantly but nothing concrete gets done such as they are doing at Milwaukee and has been put in place as far as a revamped Gentile Center at Loyola.

Also, UIC was probably able to accomplish the building of this facility in a recession because they have an enrollment nearly 6 times that of Valpo's.

It wasn't UIC it was Loyola that revamped the Gentile Center. Loyola's enrollment is 9,077 as of fall 2011 certainly not 6 times Valpo's enrollment. Butler is the only school in the conference that has comparable enrollment to Valpo.

[valpotx]

Loyola also has an endowment that is over twice that of Valpo.  I believe they have the highest in the HL?

[historyman]

Loyola also has an endowment that is over twice that of Valpo.  I believe they have the highest in the HL?

Yes, and they could have spent the money that was spent on the revamped Gentile Center on dorms, a new chapel, new academic buildings, parking structures, etc. I don't see why their endowment size is relevant to the decision to put their money into athletic facilities.

[valpotx]

It is relevant as I imagine that means they have more money to spend on such things.  I believe someone said the renovations cost $100 million?  If you have double the money of another school, it is a little easier to make such additions.  I haven't been on Loyola's campus, but what do their academic buildings and dorms look like condition-wise? 

[historyman]

It is relevant as I imagine that means they have more money to spend on such things.  I believe someone said the renovations cost $100 million?  If you have double the money of another school, it is a little easier to make such additions.  I haven't been on Loyola's campus, but what do their academic buildings and dorms look like condition-wise? 

Here is a statement from the president of Loyola University Chicago that specifically mentions the Loyola basketball team. It is from August of 2011.

It was ten years ago that Michael J. Garanzini, S.J., became the president of this institution.
In that time an extraordinary amount of progress has taken place. It's more than buildings going
up and coming down, although campus improvements are a major part of the University's
evolution. It's also increased enrollments, expanded programming, and more.
On the occasion of this anniversary, we celebrate all that has been accomplished
in the past decade, not only on the part of Father Garanzini, whose leadership has certainly
guided the University well, but in gratitude to everyone who has worked so hard to create the
best possible environment for learning, growth, and service to others.
Loyola magazine asked Father Garanzini to reflect on his tenure—and to look ahead.

The University's greatest accomplishments:
• I think the first hurdle was putting Loyola on a financial model that allowed for sufficient margin with opportunity to invest in the future. We put about $600 million into infrastructure: that's taking care of old plant, renovating plant, and then building new plant. Getting that model in place was crucial.
• Loyola had the opportunity to seize the wave of Chicago's own economic growth over the past ten years. We've been able to take advantage of the city's marvelous transformation by being ourselves a player in that transformation.
• We're much more conscious of our mission and identity as a Jesuit, Catholic, urban, research institution. We're much more deliberate in stating and living up to that specific identity.
• We've been able to plan for the future, with regard to the medical center, in a very difficult and changing health science and medical environment.
• We've grown from a local to an international, worldwide institution. Our presence in Vietnam and Beijing, establishing a permanent home for the Rome Center, and working with the Jesuit universities in Peru and Indonesia are just examples of the kind of international perspective we've gained in the past decade.

Hopes for the next ten years:
• I'd like us to become a model of sustainability and
innovation in education.
• I'd like us to become an even more student-centered institution that recognizes the curricular and cocurricular opportunities and the necessity for a very deliberate student plan. I want the value we impart to our students to be apparent and demonstrable.
• We have to keep securing financial resources for students of modest means, especially first-generation students. This is a vital part of our mission.
• We need to continue gaining a reputation for our stellar programs. This includes health research and medicine, law, business, and the Centers of Excellence. It also includes our basketball program. I think we have the right team in place to do all of this. Our vice presidents, deans, and directors are on board, prepared, and enthusiastic. Loyola's in a great place to accomplish as much or more in the next ten years as we have in the past. It's a wonderful time to be here.

I wonder if you would ever see the mention of the basketball team in a statement of hopes by a university president at Valpo.

[historyman]

It took some digging and here is the info on "Reimagine" Loyola-Chicago's 5 year project that the Gentile Center renovation was a part of.

http://www.luc.edu/reimagine/aboutreimagine/

You can click on each phase to see what it entails. The projects of the "Reimagine" building program are running from January 2010 to 2015.

[valpo84]

1. The Father's first bullet points could easily be used to describe Valpo's past 10 years and more, just substitute Lutheran for Jesuit.

2. Do you really want a college president to single out one program? Generally, schools that have set an academic institution's main goals as athletics and a specific program, have had some notable implosions of infractions. Loyola's hoops program used to compete for national championships. It had a history which has dropped from its last decent days during the Alexander "the Great" Hughes days of the late 1980s. For Valpo, and Mark Heckler has stated that he believes in D1 sports and believes in the Horizon League, but it also has to do it the right way. Valpo's jump to the Horizon, let's not forget, was a statement of committment to D1 athletics, and higher level athletics. We have competed and are starting to win championships in this conference. We started two new D1 sports, women's and men's golf and women's bowling (already a nationally ranked team). That required foresight and funding.

3. We have had two major capital campaigns in the past decade. I'm guessing that we will see another one in the near future. I personally hope the ARC renovations are embodied in the campaign, but as part of an overall program to help as many student-athletes and the student body as possible. We need desperately a fieldhouse with intramural courts, weight room, fitness center, etc.

4. President Heckler has answered questions on this:

"HECKLER: We have some significant work ahead. We need to continue to improve our support facilities for women's teams. We have to determine the best long term strategy to enhance our vibrant and competitive basketball programs, and to do that in a away that will attract accomplished scholar-athletes to Valpo.

We need to honor the commitment we have made to provide a track for our track team and others who want to engage in competitive running. And we need a visionary plan for athletics and the facilities that will support our teams and build valpo's prominence and distiction as the finest Lutheran university in the world."

You can watch and hear this interview at, click on "Athletics":
http://www.valpo.edu/valpomag/assets/video.php?headline=Q%20and%20A%20with%20President%20Mark%20A.%20Heckler&video=hecklerQA

[valpotx]

Every time I have heard him speak he mentions how important athletics are to Valpo's image.  With that, he has also stated that investing further into athletics is something he wants to do.

[vu72]

84 mentioned that a new fitness center should be part of a new campaign.  Don't we have a new fitness center that was completed a couple of years ago?  Is that inadequate too??

[valporun]

72, I think 84 is talking a new fitness center that is more of a fieldhouse? The fieldhouse would have intramural basketball and tennis courts, an indoor track facility for running/walking purposes, weight and cardio rooms, all the things you can find at other private schools of Valpo's size, enrollment, endowment levels. The new fitness center might be currently adequate, but it is missing those options for other activities to happen without having to put on a jacket and warm clothing in the winter months to quickly run over to the ARC to shoot some baskets, swim some laps, play some racquetball, or anything like that.

[vu72]

I live in the northeast.  What I see here from multiple schools (both private and public) is focusing their alumni involvement. Science building? -- develop a program, target the donors and raise the $$; new library? -- develop a program.  Move to D-I ? -- build a stadium; etc. etc. 

Having been clueless for 40 some years about VU athletic fund raising (except for the periodic V-Club requests for help and the FITT thing a ways back), I ask this question: When have the resources of athletic alumni (600 out of 3800 each year? -- probably more than graduate annually with a degree in biology) been truly harnessed and focused on upgrading VU to D-I facility-wise?  All of our posts are good in that it raises our BP levels.  But the next step is necessary -- that raised attitude is needed to drive people together to raise the funds. 

But it appears that there is no one trying to harness this apparently large well of potential energy.  Is there anyone in the athletic department truly qualified to inventory and coordinate this energy and focus it in the direction I am hearing  all of us want it to go?

Here's what I'd like to see/hear:  "VU Alums! We are now a D-I University in all sports.  We have to complete the track around Brown Field and renovate the stands, adding 2000 seats, expanding the press box, and enclosing the field with a 6' berm and a steel/brick fence.  It will cost $x. This will make the football, men's and women's soccer and the men's and women's track and field programs D-I competitive. The total cost is $W and the university has invested $X to initiate this effort.  Ground is being broken in Y months.  But to finish this we need your help to pay for the rest of it and that will be $Z."

Similarly -- "In addition to the new scoreboard, the ARC needs upgrading.  We are installing really cool reserved seating and .... whatever (sorry, I don't know much about this). It will cost $X.  The construction begins in Y months and to complete this we need $Z from you to help to pay for it."

Truthfully, as an alumni of 45 years I have never been confronted with these kinds of challenges -- but I would welcome them. Why?  Because I'd know exactly where my $ is going and I would be able to follow the fund raising progress. FITT did not do it (for me at least).

I have great personal memories about my four years at Valpo.  But from 900 miles away, I have very few things that I can point to with PRIDE about my university (except, maybe, for Bryce's shot in the NCAA tourney) that I can share with people who didn't go to VU.  Right now all my friends here see are occasional BB wins on ESPN and a lot of lopsided losses (29 straight) in FB and BB (AU, OSU).  i'd like to find a way to participate in programs to change that. Maybe I'm just not on the right mailing lists and I certainly don't see much  mention of this type of thing in the alumni glossy publications.

Is that you Harry?  We've never met but based on your time at valpo and your position I'm wondering whether or not you are part of a family that had three brothers play football.

As for your highlighted sentence, were you references just athletics or the Universities reputation in general.  There are many accomplishments for its students( a Business School team winning a national SAP competition for marketing against schools from all over the country including the Ivy League) and facilities in several areas that put us in an extremely elite area (Meteorology, Engineering).  Clearly we are the only Lutheran institution with a national image--students from every state and more than 50 foreign countries. (I know because I speak with potential students and parents on a regular basis), with new facilities that will keep us competitive.

As stated earlier, I agree with all the suggested changes to athletic facilities, just reacting to your general comment.  Check out the Valpo site on a regular basis and you'll see lots of things to be proud of!  Now, if you are Harry, then you were one heck of a linebacker and a fraternity brother!

[crusaderjoe]

Don't know where the idea has come up that VU ended up with a $30 million surplus from the last capital campaign.  We may have ended up with $30 million over the announced goal, but that in no way represents a surplus, especially in light of the decline in endowment value experienced by nearly every four-year school since 2008. 

78Crusader you are right--my use of the term surplus was inaccurate.  A better way to have stated it would have been that VU had surpassed its fundraising goal by about $30M during the last major campaign. 

That notwithstanding, let me revise my original post so we can take a better look at the level of commitment by the University for its flagship sport:

Capital contributions for new campus buildings and related items from prior campaigns that concluded from 2002 to 2008:  $360,000,000.00
Capital contributions for a new arena or for significant ARC venue improvements from those campaigns - $0.00

Division I level thinking?  Only at Valpo.

[vu72]

Campaign goal or not, trust me on this, no one is holding donor's feet to the fire and saying "forget about sports, you can ONLY give money for the union"  If a major donor wanted to give say, $15 million to redo Brown Field or the ARC, there would no one standing there saying "sorry, that's just not high on our agenda now"  "How about a new science building??"

[78crusader]

I have the feeling the next capital campaign -- which is poised to begin, I think, in 2012 -- will be sort of a good news/bad news deal.  Let me break my own rule and engage in a bit of speculation:  The good news -- VU will announce its intention to build a fieldhouse on the hospital site, along with plans for a new track around Brown Field.   The bad news -- the fieldhouse is probably years away from becoming a reality, and fundraising has yet to begin for the new track. 

There are just too many other projects that need doing.  First up is a new dorm.  Second is a new science building (the cost of which will probably equal or even exceed the cost of the new union).  Third up is the renovation of Meier Hall, for the Department of Education.  Those three deals will take up most, if not all, of the money that the next capital campaign allocates to building projects. 

Hope I'm wrong and that there is an athletics project in the near term instead of the long run.

Paul

[vu72]

One of the differences between Alan Harre and Mark Heckler is the approach to fund raising and funding for individual projects.  For example, Alan would have never started the new home for Arts and Sciences until funding, including endowment was complete.  Heckler said, "we need it now, not in 5 years"  (not an actual quote but just my interpretation)

In the same way the new dorm you mention will not be funded with University resources but rather via outside investment and a long term lease from the University.  So, if you take the cost of the new dorm off the list you may very well have the dough to get some things done over at athletics.

Heckler is an innovator and sees thing differently than the typical "funding first" approach.  Hopefully the Board will agree, but from the President's office there is certainly hope.

President Heckler is doing a student led interview over on WVUR, I think, on or about December 5.  Check their site for details.  Hopefully there will be a substantive discussion about the future building projects.

[sliman]

In reviewing campaign giving, keep in mind that the total includes deferred gifts, the largest chunk of which may be estate plans, so the announced total may be significantly higher than the cash that is available in the near term.  You could borrow against that "promise," but  some institutions that have done so discovered that the loan payments were a major drain on operations (sacrificing expenditures on things such as equipment, faculty, etc) while waiting for the golden egg.