Barron Debate

Barron Debate

jrfsu-"Numbers alone can be deceiving in my opinion. Fundraising: No. Eric Barron never oversaw the raising of $100 million in a single year. But to my pretty informed knowledge no Florida State president ever raised $100 million in a fiscal year without millions of state matching gift dollars putting them over the top. As important, no Florida State president ever raised money in an economy - and most notably during a Florida real estate market collapse - quite like the one in which Barron operated for most of his tenure. You may also recall that Charles Rasberry in just three years proved a huge disaster and was forced out of the FSU Foundation presidency in mid-2009. Barron found a Lee Hinkle appointed Leon Co. based computer sales guy serving as interim FSU Foundation president when he arrived. (I'm not kidding.) Barron quickly created (a long over due) University VP for Development position and recruited a UVA development executive for the job. They seem to be doing a nice job over there stabilizing operations and reorganizing in anticipation of the campaign. By the way, capital campaigns are not typically five years in duration. Campaigns are most often five to seven years of public fundraising. Every campaign has a significant quiet phase. Though many of us know about the campaign, Florida State's technically in the quiet phase. The goal of this phase is to raise about half the funds. My understanding from folks in the know is that we've currently raised more than 50% (or more than $500 million) of the $1 billion goal and that the public kickoff is scheduled to occur this October. I am unsure whether Barron's departure will cause a delay to the public launch. Legislative performance metrics: One more point would have tied Florida State for third. Only two more points would have run us up yet higher. My limited understanding is that because one-third of our alumni live outside the state - unlike FIU, UCF and USF - a couple measures suffered quite negatively. (BTW, those "metrics" are in my opinion the typical variety of horse poo one routinely expects from Florida politicians and certainly no way to evaluate a university.) Research Funding: I am but a mere Ph.D. candidate, but it seems pretty difficult to raise research funding levels at a time your institution is hemorrhaging an average of 50 faculty members every year to institutions who can pay more. I have no idea whether Gary Ostrander was a good hire or not, but I am personally willing to give him some time in light of circumstances."

pauldirac-"I stand by my claim: By the metrics that matter for AAU membership Barron was not the great president for FSU that many on the faculty seem to be making him out to be. It is naive to cal Barron a great president for FSU given his short tenure and lack of performance on any relevant metrics. Would have been if he had stayed on 10 years? Perhaps, but we will never know. I know of no major initiative Barron launched related to research, academics or fundraising that has shown tangible improvement on any of the AAU metrics. He was a great guy at facilitating discussions about things, and Ostrander may prove to be a great hire (the jury is still out on that), but I did not see Barron make any major decisions to advance or improve the research focus at FSU. I certainly did not see FSU's research performance grow as much as our competitors did over time he was in the president's seat. Please correct me if I am wrong about this. I am not saying Barron was a terrible president. He did some some ground work to help FSU get ready to advance towards becoming an AAU university, and he calmed the turmoil after TK by appeasing faculty senate and union leaders, but we certainly did not see FSU make strides or advancement in research under his watch. Nor did I see any tangibles goals set by Barron or anyone else related to research. A lot could have happened at FSU with engineering, medicine, research funding and faculty hiring over the past 4 years but Barron definitely has taken a go slow and don't rock the boat approach at FSU. I am not saying he was terrible. But by the conventional metrics people look look at in evaluating university performance he definitely did not transform FSU in the research and academic arenas or blow people away with his fundraising ability. By any measure I am aware of he was just average. I don't see $1 billion as ambitious for FSU given the number of alumni we have, though I agree it is ambitious for FSU given its weak fundraising culture. State universities with far fewer living alumni than FSU have achieved this many times over. Maybe Barron was working on some big gifts, and perhaps he was almost ready to close the deal on that $50 or $100 million dollar gift that would put FSU in the same category as its peers, but again we will never know. "

jrfsu-"The fundraising numbers cited in the above post are pulled from FSU Foundation annual reports. What the poster failed to note is that fundraising totals listed in Foundation annual reports published before 2009 included Seminole Booster fundraising. Foundation annual reports published since 2009 list only FSU Foundation fundraising totals. As I already mentioned reported numbers also fail to acknowledge that before 2009 MILLIONS of FSU Foundation raised dollars came from State Matching gift program (from the state legislature) and ignores that Ringling gifts inflated FSU Foundation fundraising totals in many years. See below for better explanation: FY 2013: Of the nearly $70 million raised by just the FSU Foundation. A) $0 came from state matching funds from legislature. B) Ringling accounted for just $2.9 million. FY 2012: Of the $50 million raised by just the FSU Foundation. A) $0 came from state matching funds from legislature. B) Ringling accounted for just $2.3 million. FY 2011: Of the $51 million raised by just the FSU Foundation. A) $0 came from state matching funds from legislature. B) Ringling accounted for just $1.3 million. 2010: Of the almost $52 million raised by just the FSU Foundation. A) $0 came from state matching funds from legislature. B) Ringling accounted for only about $2.5 million. 2009: Of the $39 million raised by just FSU Foundation. A) $0 in state matching funds from legislature. B) Ringling raised just $330 thousand. 2008: Of the $96 million raised by the FSU Foundation and Seminole Boosters: A) $17.5 million of the FSU Foundation's total derived from state matching funds from the legislature. B) $28.5 million were Ringling gifts. C) $32 million were Booster gifts. 2007: Of the $60 million raised by the FSU Foundation and Seminole Boosters: A) $15 million of the FSU Foundation's total derived from state matching funds from the legislature. B) $5 million were Ringling gifts. C) $6 million were Booster gifts. 2006: Of the record $113 million raised by the FSU Foundation and Seminole Boosters: A) $2.5 million of the FSU Foundation's total came from state matching funds from the legislature; B) $40 million were gifts to Ringling; C) $18.5 million were Booster gifts; 2005: Of the $97 million raised by the FSU Foundation and Seminole Boosters: A) $15.5 million of the FSU Foundation's total came from state matching funds from the legislature. B) $11 million to Ringling. C) $32 million to Boosters."