President Atkinson announces retirement
effective Oct. 1, 2003

Wednesday, November 13, 2002
Michael Reese (510) 987-9200
michael.reese@ucop.edu
Brad Hayward (510) 987-9200
brad.hayward@ucop.edu

University of California President Richard C. Atkinson — who has initiated national reforms in college admissions testing, spearheaded new approaches to admissions and outreach in the post-affirmative action era at UC, and propelled research innovations to accelerate the university's contributions to the California economy — announced today (Nov. 13) his intention to retire as president effective Oct. 1, 2003.

The 17th president of the University of California system, Atkinson has led the university through a period of dramatic physical and programmatic growth. UC's enrollment has increased by approximately 30,000 students, the nine existing campuses have expanded to meet the growing needs of the state, and UC has broken ground on a 10th campus in the San Joaquin Valley.

Meanwhile, Atkinson has placed a high priority on maintaining and enhancing the university's world-renowned standards of excellence in teaching, research, and public service. He also has been a leading voice for the central role of research universities in the knowledge-based economy and for UC's obligation to serve all of the multifaceted populations of California.

Atkinson, 73, took office Oct. 1, 1995, and will have served for eight years when he steps down. Of the 17 presidents of the University of California, only four have served longer. In addition, at the time of his retirement, Atkinson will have spent the last 27 years as either director of the National Science Foundation, chancellor of UC San Diego, or president of the UC system.

"That is a lengthy period of time for positions of this kind," Atkinson told the Board of Regents at a meeting in San Francisco. "These have been extremely rewarding years — challenging, stimulating, and deeply interesting years. But the time has come to bring them to a close, and to allow the University to move forward under new leadership. It also is time, I might add, for my grandchildren to see more of their grandfather."

Upon his retirement, Atkinson and his wife, Rita, will return to San Diego, where they lived from 1980 to 1995 during Atkinson's tenure as chancellor of UC San Diego. The Board of Regents will name a new president after a national search, and a search committee of Regents will be appointed shortly by Chairman John Moores.

Atkinson noted that he assumed the presidency at a time when the university was grappling with severe budget constraints and a bitter conflict over affirmative action. However, he said, the university has recovered and thrived - recruiting and retaining a faculty of the highest quality, maintaining access for California's brightest students, expanding outreach and teacher professional development programs to support the improvement of the public schools, planning intelligently for growth, and offering countless new innovations to help solve many of the problems facing California and the nation.

"It is not the president who is solely, or even chiefly, responsible for these achievements," Atkinson said. "It is the University of California community — the Regents, faculty, staff, students, parents, alumni, and friends of the University. And that is why, even in a time of budget uncertainty once again, I am confident in the University's continued vitality.

"Over the next 10 months, I will work to keep the University's budget on as firm a footing as possible and to provide a smooth transition for my successor as president. But for the long term, this University's success lies in the capable hands of our creative, energetic, and dedicated community of people."

Atkinson, a cognitive scientist whose research has dealt with problems of memory, cognition, and learning, was a longtime member of the Stanford University faculty and also spent three years on the UCLA faculty. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Education. He has served as president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and as chair of the Association of American Universities. A mountain in Antarctica has been named in his honor.

After serving as director of the National Science Foundation in Washington, D.C., Atkinson was named chancellor of UCSD in 1980. The campus grew substantially during his tenure and rose to national prominence as one of the nation's leading research universities.

In August 1995, Atkinson was named UC president by the Board of Regents. Atkinson's responsibilities as president include oversight of 10 campuses enrolling nearly 200,000 students, five medical centers, three national laboratories managed by UC for the federal government, and a systemwide workforce of more than 170,000 people.

Atkinson took office just months after the Board of Regents adopted SP-1, a resolution that eliminated consideration of race and ethnicity in the UC admissions process. Under Atkinson's leadership, the university embarked on a dramatic expansion of its outreach programs to K-12 schools, working to improve the academic performance and college preparation of students from all backgrounds. In addition, at the urging of Gov. Gray Davis, the university vastly expanded its professional development programs for teachers in California's public schools to help bolster school performance across the state.

Meanwhile, with Atkinson's support, the Board of Regents rescinded SP-1 in May 2001, though voter-approved Proposition 209 continued to prohibit consideration of race in admissions.

The university also has initiated two new programs, Eligibility in the Local Context and the Dual Admissions Program, to ensure that high-achieving students in all California high schools have access to a UC education. These two measures were intended to send a strong message to high school students to take challenging courses and do their best. That message also was underscored by the initiative for which Atkinson became nationally known: taking on the SAT.

In February 2001, Atkinson proposed that UC no longer use the SAT I exam, but instead use achievement tests tied to the high school curriculum. He argued that students should be assessed on their mastery of core subject areas, not on vague notions of aptitude or innate intelligence. Though his focus was on UC's needs, ultimately the makers of the SAT I agreed to reform the exam on a national basis. Starting in 2005, students will take a new SAT I that includes a written essay, more advanced mathematics, and elimination of question types such as verbal analogies that bear only a hazy relationship to what students are taught in school.

Meanwhile, even as the UC system was planning for a 40 percent enrollment increase between 1998 and 2010, Atkinson kept a focus on preserving quality at the university. Faculty salaries rebounded to competitive levels, federal research funding and private donations set new records, Nobel Prizes were awarded to 12 UC researchers, and two more UC campuses became members of the prestigious Association of American Universities. Currently, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UC Irvine, UCLA, UC San Diego, and UC Santa Barbara are all members of the AAU — making UC the only university system in the nation with more than one campus in the association.

Atkinson also focused on hiring high-quality individuals to run the campuses; he hired eight of the 10 current UC chancellors. Domestic-partner benefits were extended to UC employees and child-care centers on the UC campuses were expanded during this period, part of a series of initiatives to help recruit and retain the highest-quality staff.

Atkinson placed special emphasis on the benefits to the economy of university research and launched new initiatives to further the impact. The Industry-University Cooperative Research Program was formed to promote partnerships with industry in fields critical to California's economic future. Atkinson and Governor Davis launched the California Institutes for Science and Innovation, four UC-based research centers focusing on cutting-edge scientific research aimed at improving California's economy and quality of life. And, under Atkinson the university expanded its enrollments of engineering and computer science students by more than 50 percent to better meet California's workforce needs.

In addition to launching a 10th campus at Merced, the university opened a new academic center in Washington, DC; expanded its presence in London and Mexico City; and began work on an ambitious new health sciences campus at Mission Bay for UC San Francisco.

Other initiatives launched during Atkinson's presidency include the California Digital Library, which brings together the electronic collections of the UC libraries in an online repository; the Master of Advanced Study, a new degree program for working adults; a series of programs to increase California's ties with Mexico in the fields of education, technology, and health care; and efforts to expand graduate student enrollments after many years of stagnation.

"I have been honored to serve as your president, and I owe many people a debt of gratitude," Atkinson told the Regents in announcing his retirement today. "Most of all, I want to thank you for the opportunity to serve this great University and the people of California."

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