Michael Markham, the third dean candidate for the Dodge Family College of Arts and Sciences, spoke on his plans to improve the college during a public forum Thursday afternoon.
Markham has worked at OU since 2011. He is the associate dean for academic programs in the College of Arts and Sciences and a Case-Hooper professor of biology. In June, Markham was appointed as the OU Honors College interim dean.
Markham studied psychology at the University of New Mexico, where he earned his bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees.
Markham’s research focuses on neurobiology, specifically the biophysics of excitable membranes and the plasticity of excitable cells. He has also conducted research on behavioral conditioning in humans and animals.
Before joining OU, he was a research scientist at the University of Texas at Austin. At Florida International University, Markham worked as a research associate professor and an assistant professor.
“This college has a lot of potential. It’s on a strong trajectory, and we've got some work to do to keep that going,” Markham said
Institutional success
Markham said OU joining the Association of American Universities was integral to institutional success.
The Association of American Universities is an invitation-only organization of America’s leading research universities credited for life changing education, research and innovation. Member universities earn the majority of federal funding for research that improves public health, seeks to address national challenges and contributes to the education and training of younger generations.
Part of the Lead On, University strategic plan is for OU to become an institution recognized by the AAU.
“The University of Oklahoma is looking at a plan for institutional success that is bold and it's clear and it's unequivocal …,” Markham said. “The core of it is still the same, to lead as a top tier public research university, and by that we mean become an AAU university to empower students for a life of success.”
If chosen for the position, Markham said he wanted to continue the college’s focus of undergraduate education because it’s important for AAU membership and part of OU’s core mission as a land grant university.
“The increases we’ve seen in undergraduate enrollments are only going to continue accelerating,” Markham said. “We’re going to be faced with challenges of how we scale up our educational opportunities and keep the excellence that we still provide.”
Markham said he would also recruit, retain and promote the success of the college’s faculty and staff members.
“If we don’t create the proper structures of staff, if we don’t bring in more staff and if we don’t develop and support the staff that we have, those three goals above move out of reach,” Markham said.
Experience
Markham spoke about his administrative experience and how it has prepared him to lead a large college like the College of Arts and Sciences.
Markham started as an assistant chair in the Department of Biology, one of the largest units on campus. He started his position as the associate dean for academic programs in January 2020, eight weeks before the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
“My main job was making sure that the center held, that the institution continued to serve its mission in the face of intense pressure from outside of the university,” Markham said.
Markham said he’s led important strategic initiatives in the various positions he’s been in at OU.
OU announced in January that Sutton Hall would be demolished for the construction of a new life sciences building.
Markham said he led the team that developed the initial report that was presented to executive leadership to advocate for the construction of the life sciences building.
As the Honors College interim dean, Markham said he was tasked to manage the college through a period of major transition.
“While I was working with that college, we produced the first comprehensive strategic plan that college has had in about 20 years,” Markham said.
Markham said a dean’s behavior sets the tone of the college and, if chosen for the position, he would value integrity, transparency and unity within the college.
“This college is about the people that make it up, and a dean's responsibility is service, service to all, service to students, service to the staff, serves to the faculty and serves to the alumni of the college,” Markham said.
Markham said the college needs to benchmark other arts and sciences colleges and the metrics and indicators for entry to the AAU. During his presentation, he compared the College of Arts and Sciences to the ones in other AAU public universities.
“We need to catch up with these near peer institutions,” Markham said.
Changes within the College
After a member of the audience asked how he would address changes within the college, Markham said the climate of higher education is inherently dynamic so it’s important the college becomes flexible.
“The context and the climate of higher education is so dynamic, and it is shifting so quickly, and there are so many forces working outside of higher education that provide movements in this different direction,” Markham said “We have to get comfortable to change this. Change is going to be constant. It's going to be inevitable.”
OU Provost’s Office requested in November an evaluation of the College of Arts and Sciences foreign language requirements, raising concerns from the OU community that the undergraduate language requirement would be removed.
Markham told OU Daily that it’s important for those worried to remember that the review was just a move for administration to step back and understand how language requirements were beneficial for students.
“I can state absolutely, unequivocally that I'm committed to the importance of languages within liberal arts education that we have in Arts and Sciences,” Markham said. “What we need to be open to is that there are different ways of delivering that language instruction.”
This story was edited by Ismael Lele.
