Mun Choi commits to $500 million in University of Missouri faculty salary increases
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Mun Choi in his "State of the University" talk on Tuesday in Jesse Auditorium committed to $500 million in faculty salary increases over 10 years.
The University of Missouri System president and flagship campus chancellor referred to them as "performance-based" salary increases.
"We need a long-term sustained plan" for faculty salary increases, Choi said.
There were several initiatives included in Choi's wide-ranging speech to the crowd of more than 700 that included faculty, students and community members.
MizzouForward
The talk served as his introduction of the $1.5 billion MizzouForward investment strategy to the wider community beyond the campus.
"It is our blueprint to transform the institution into the future," Choi said of MizzouForward.
The plan includes $550 million to hire new tenured and tenure-track faculty.
In explaining faculty support for national honors and awards, Choi said the program will identify faculty members with high award potential and train them to pursue the awards.
He promoted the Provost Programs of Excellence to encourage publication of more books by faculty members and more mid-career research development.
Improving MU's standing among American Association of Universities institutions is a focus of the strategy, he said.
Student-focused projects
MizzouForward funded $4 million combined in 51 student-focused projects, at up to $100,000 each, Choi said. They included funding of an additional robot dog, an outdoor learning space for architectural studies and development of 3-D organ models for medical students.
"This type of investment will have an impact at the individual and the collective level," Choi said. "We can, we must do more to support our students."
The projects were chosen based on those that would make the maximum impact on students, Provost Latha Ramchand said after Choi's talk, speaking with reporters.
Research Reactor
The MU Research Reactor produces 11,000 doses of radioisotopes for cancer treatments each week, Choi said.
"We have something that no other university can match, and that is the research reactor," Choi said.
Plans Choi announced include a $20 million investment in the MU Research Reactor West, to open in 2024. It will be used to produce more radioisotopes.
The U.S. Department of Energy also will open a $27 million Radioisotope Science Center on campus in 2024.
"Imagine how many lives the work of this university touches, not only in the United States, but throughout the world," Choi said of the research reactor.
There are plans for a second research reactor in the future.
"Our facility is going to be 50 years old very soon," Choi said. "I'm very sorry, not 50 — 60 years old."
The reactor went online in 1966.
"It is a massive project," Choi said of the second research reactor, speaking with reporters after his talk. "It will probably be 10 years away."
Choi promoted the Roy Blunt NextGen Precision Health Building as a factor in recruiting new faculty members devoted to high-level research.
rmckinney@columbiatribune.com
573-815-1719
This article originally appeared on Columbia Daily Tribune: University of Missouri president talks research, faculty recruitment
