Rutgers University, the largest institution of higher learning in New Jersey, has a new leader, among other institutional changes. Dr. Robert Barchi, the 20th president of Rutgers, told NJ Today Managing Editor Mike Schneider that he came to Rutgers from Jefferson University in Philadelphia because of the great opportunity offered by the Garden State institution.
“This is an institution that’s at a pivotal point in its history. It’s a great institution that can be even greater than it is,” Barchi said. “It has wonderful, wonderful programs that are not well enough known. And it now has an opportunity to grow in areas that it hadn’t been in before.”
Barchi looks forward to growing Rutgers in the health care segment. “Now with this reorganization, we can put this other limb on Rutgers that was missing,” he said. “And now we really are that full spectrum university that includes the health care sciences as well as the rest of the sciences.”
According to Barchi, the college merger won’t cause a renaming of schools because the schools already have distinction. There will be some changes, however. “What we’d like to do is link them in more closely with all the resources that we already have on the Rutgers campus,” he said.
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While the number of students will likely remain the same, Barchi said he expects the number of researchers and research projects on the campuses to expand.
The college merger plan has evolved, Barchi said. “When I started talking to Rutgers last spring, the issue of health care and higher ed reorganization was certainly in the air. But the legislation being envisioned was totally different,” he said. “And there was changes happening that were planned to happen in Camden and a smaller reorganization in the health care area.”
Barchi said he likes the legislation that eventually passed better than other proposals. “I’m really committed to one Rutgers with three campuses. I think Rutgers belongs in South Jersey. It has a very important role there,” he said. “I think we can help Rowan and Cooper grow much more as Rutgers in Camden than we ever could by separating the campus.”
The Rutgers sports program has taken some heat for the amount of subsidies received. Barchi said he would like the general fund subsidy to athletics to eventually be reduced to zero, but that can’t happen overnight. “We reduced it by $1 million between last year and this year,” he said. “I’d like to see that rate of progression over the next few years as well and I think we can do that.”
Barchi said he believes the sports program can thrive without the subsidies, as long as the school does a better job with marketing and media contracts. “It needed to be run in a business like way and we needed to make sure that the revenues that were available to the program were being brought in appropriately,” he said. “I think the conference needed to be more aggressive in marketing itself and getting its share of the media dollar.”
The scores in sporting events aren’t that important to Barchi. “I don’t look at athletics just from the point of view of winning. I’m really serious about this. Our program is about athletics and academics,” he said. “And I am as proud of the fact that we have the highest academic progression rating in the country as the fact that we might be 6 and 4 or unbeaten.”