“If you’re not using our space well and productively and being competitive for research, don’t think you have dibs on that space forever,” he said. “It’s too expensive an asset to be used without a great deal of productivity.”
During his Feb. 14 State of the University address, Bienen expressed concerns that NU wasn’t increasing its research funding quickly enough.
“Federal funding for basic research through the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation had double-digit increases last year and is expected to continue, but the amount of research funding we were awarded increased much more slowly,” he said. “Having started several new science buildings and renovated the Technological Institute, it is now critical for faculty and staff to increase our efforts to compete successfully for such funding.”
Bienen later told The Daily that his statement “was meant to be a message” to faculty that their research needed to be more productive. He said the message was focused on faculty in medical, engineering and life sciences departments.
Administrators in the chemistry, biomedical engineering and biochemistry departments declined to give The Daily information about how much space the departments have for research.
McCormick Prof. Buckley Crist Jr. said he agreed with Bienen that professors should use the space they’re allocated effectively or give it up to someone who will.
“The university has finite resources,” he said. “If certain resources aren’t being used productively, they shouldn’t be continued.”
But Daniel Linzer, an associate dean of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences and a biochemistry professor, said professors in his department already strive to use research space productively.
“Everybody is aware that research space is supposed to be used to do research,” he said. “If one person’s research is growing while another’s is shrinking, then space is re-allocated to better meet the needs.”
Linzer also said long-term perspective was needed when moving professors around to different offices.
“If somebody loses one grant, you don’t immediately throw them out of their space,” he said. “You don’t want to move people around every six months.”
Neurology Prof. William Klein said professors need to be productive, but that research space within his department was stretched thinly among professors.
“(Allocating space by productivity) is a sensible thing, but we’re hanging on to our space by our fingernails,” he said. “Research space at all universities is at a premium.”
Klein also said he wanted to know what standards administrators might use to define “productivity,” adding that faculty in his department did not need a message to use their space wisely.
“Right now, within the life sciences, I see space being used extremely efficiently,” he said. “I see my colleagues bring in lots of money. There aren’t people who are just sitting on their hands.”
He also said NU could look into rearranging its available space so it could be used more efficiently. He pointed to NU’s Children’s Memorial Institute for Education and Research facility in downtown Chicago as an example of a small NU research space being used efficiently.
“There’s less square footage there, but it’s so beautifully organized and beautifully put together that everyone who works there loves it,” he said.
