CHAPEL HILL – The coronavirus pandemic certainly brought challenges to UNC-Chapel Hill.
But it also prompted advances, Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz says in the accompanying video from a recent Zoom interview.
Innovations in online instruction, of course, have been most prominent. And that has implications for the University’s reach.
“We’re going to be able to expand our footprint, because we’ve learned that we could teach more students than ever before,” Guskiewicz says.
Certainly, he says, the University looks forward to resuming residential instruction and its amenities: Sporting events. Playmakers Theatre. Memorial Hall.
But some students might want to take a semester online. The University might offer new degree programs that are partially online. And it is finding new ways to reach international students.
“I think we’ll be a reimagined university,” Guskiewicz says.
For a university with more than its share of old buildings, Guskiewicz said in a previous interview, it’s been a challenge to find “swing space” for workers to use while their buildings are renovated. But with the demonstrated success of teleworking, employees might now be able to simply work from home.
Researchers have even found new ways to conduct research online, he says.
And Carolina is still setting records for research funding, with more than $1.0 billion in sponsored research in 2020. UNC-Chapel Hill ranked 5th nationally and 1st in the South in federal R&D funding for public and private universities in fiscal 2018.1
“I just couldn’t be happier with the (research) trajectory that we’re on,” Guskiewicz says.
Though the pandemic has threatened the University’s operating budget in major ways, Carolina’s $4.25 billion capital campaign has actually gained momentum as donors decide to support such innovations.
“We had a wonderful November-December, better than we have in the past couple years in the campaign,” Guskiewicz says.
“Some of that’s focused on some of the innovations, and people wanting to think about how Carolina will be that reimagined university and contributing to those efforts.”
Leave a Reply