0:00:00.536,0:00:04.598 So I'll be talking about the success of my campus, 0:00:04.598,0:00:07.348 the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, UMBC, 0:00:07.348,0:00:10.539 in educating students of all types, 0:00:10.539,0:00:14.666 across the arts and humanities and the science and engineering areas. 0:00:14.666,0:00:18.744 What makes our story especially important 0:00:18.744,0:00:23.952 is that we have learned so much from a group of students 0:00:23.952,0:00:27.299 who are typically not at the top of the academic ladder -- 0:00:27.299,0:00:31.297 students of color, students underrepresented in selected areas. 0:00:31.297,0:00:34.148 And what makes the story especially unique 0:00:34.148,0:00:38.982 is that we have learned how to help African-American students, Latino students, 0:00:38.982,0:00:40.786 students from low-income backgrounds, 0:00:40.786,0:00:44.244 to become some of the best in the world in science and engineering. 0:00:44.244,0:00:47.714 And so I begin with a story about my childhood. 0:00:47.714,0:00:50.786 We all are products of our childhood experiences. 0:00:50.786,0:00:54.964 It's hard for me to believe that it's been 50 years 0:00:54.964,0:01:00.870 since I had the experience of being a ninth grade kid in Birmingham, Alabama, 0:01:00.870,0:01:03.037 a kid who loved getting A's, 0:01:03.037,0:01:05.724 a kid who loved math, who loved to read, 0:01:05.724,0:01:08.453 a kid who would say to the teacher -- 0:01:08.453,0:01:11.709 when the teacher said, "Here are 10 problems," to the class, 0:01:11.709,0:01:15.790 this little fat kid would say, "Give us 10 more." 0:01:15.790,0:01:19.102 And the whole class would say, "Shut up, Freeman." 0:01:19.102,0:01:22.716 And there was a designated kicker every day. 0:01:22.716,0:01:24.597 And so I was always asking this question: 0:01:24.597,0:01:30.554 "Well how could we get more kids to really love to learn?" 0:01:30.554,0:01:33.672 And amazingly, one week in church, 0:01:33.672,0:01:35.754 when I really didn't want to be there 0:01:35.754,0:01:40.855 and I was in the back of the room being placated by doing math problems, 0:01:40.855,0:01:43.291 I heard this man say this: 0:01:43.291,0:01:45.773 "If we can get the children 0:01:45.773,0:01:51.770 to participate in this peaceful demonstration here in Birmingham, 0:01:51.770,0:01:57.171 we can show America that even children know the difference between right and wrong 0:01:57.171,0:02:01.904 and that children really do want to get the best possible education." 0:02:01.904,0:02:03.625 And I looked up and said, "Who is that man?" 0:02:03.625,0:02:06.754 And they said his name was Dr. Martin Luther King. 0:02:06.754,0:02:08.685 And I said to my parents, "I've got to go. 0:02:08.685,0:02:10.254 I want to go. I want to be a part of this." 0:02:10.254,0:02:12.124 And they said, "Absolutely not." 0:02:12.124,0:02:13.337 (Laughter) 0:02:13.337,0:02:15.255 And we had a rough go of it. 0:02:15.255,0:02:18.708 And at that time, quite frankly, you really did not talk back to your parents. 0:02:18.708,0:02:20.995 And somehow I said, "You know, you guys are hypocrites. 0:02:20.995,0:02:22.972 You make me go to this. You make me listen. 0:02:22.972,0:02:25.206 The man wants me to go, and now you say no." 0:02:25.206,0:02:26.954 And they thought about it all night. 0:02:26.954,0:02:29.088 And they came into my room the next morning. 0:02:29.088,0:02:30.588 They had not slept. 0:02:30.588,0:02:33.104 They had been literally crying and praying and thinking, 0:02:33.104,0:02:36.664 "Will we let our 12-year-old 0:02:36.664,0:02:40.816 participate in this march and probably have to go to jail?" 0:02:40.816,0:02:42.505 And they decided to do it. 0:02:42.505,0:02:43.887 And when they came in to tell me, 0:02:43.887,0:02:45.672 I was at first elated. 0:02:45.672,0:02:49.604 And then all of a sudden I began thinking about the dogs and the fire hoses, 0:02:49.604,0:02:52.486 and I got really scared, I really did. 0:02:52.486,0:02:54.588 And one of the points I make to people all the time 0:02:54.588,0:02:57.823 is that sometimes when people do things that are courageous, 0:02:57.823,0:03:00.172 it doesn't really mean that they're that courageous. 0:03:00.172,0:03:03.020 It simply means that they believe it's important to do it. 0:03:03.020,0:03:04.771 I wanted a better education. 0:03:04.771,0:03:08.004 I did not want to have to have hand-me-down books. 0:03:08.004,0:03:10.487 I wanted to know that the school I attended 0:03:10.487,0:03:12.912 not only had good teachers, but the resources we needed. 0:03:12.912,0:03:14.588 And as a result of that experience, 0:03:14.588,0:03:16.922 in the middle of the week, while I was there in jail, 0:03:16.922,0:03:19.472 Dr. King came and said with our parents, 0:03:19.472,0:03:22.437 "What you children do this day 0:03:22.437,0:03:27.021 will have an impact on children who have not been born." 0:03:27.021,0:03:31.956 I recently realized that two-thirds of Americans today 0:03:31.956,0:03:35.470 had not been born at the time of 1963. 0:03:35.470,0:03:38.411 And so for them, when they hear about the Children's Crusade in Birmingham, 0:03:38.411,0:03:40.673 in many ways, if they see it on TV, 0:03:40.673,0:03:44.087 it's like our looking at the 1863 "Lincoln" movie: 0:03:44.087,0:03:45.521 It's history. 0:03:45.521,0:03:48.494 And the real question is, what lessons did we learn? 0:03:48.494,0:03:51.386 Well amazingly, the most important for me was this: 0:03:51.386,0:03:56.686 That children can be empowered to take ownership of their education. 0:03:56.686,0:03:59.037 They can be taught to be passionate 0:03:59.037,0:04:03.578 about wanting to learn and to love the idea of asking questions. 0:04:03.578,0:04:06.373 And so it is especially significant 0:04:06.373,0:04:08.459 that the university I now lead, 0:04:08.459,0:04:11.254 the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, UMBC, 0:04:11.254,0:04:17.040 was founded the very year I went to jail with Dr. King, in 1963. 0:04:17.040,0:04:21.210 And what made that institutional founding especially important 0:04:21.210,0:04:25.744 is that Maryland is the South, as you know, 0:04:25.744,0:04:30.326 and, quite frankly, it was the first university in our state 0:04:30.326,0:04:34.402 founded at a time when students of all races could go there. 0:04:34.402,0:04:37.975 And so we had black and white students and others who began to attend. 0:04:37.975,0:04:42.160 And it has been for 50 years an experiment. 0:04:42.160,0:04:43.860 The experiment is this: 0:04:43.860,0:04:47.819 Is it possible to have institutions in our country, universities, 0:04:47.819,0:04:50.756 where people from all backgrounds can come and learn 0:04:50.756,0:04:54.339 and learn to work together and learn to become leaders 0:04:54.339,0:04:57.912 and to support each other in that experience? 0:04:57.912,0:05:02.827 Now what is especially important about that experience for me is this: 0:05:02.827,0:05:07.495 We found that we could do a lot in the arts and humanities and social sciences. 0:05:07.495,0:05:10.051 And so we began to work on that, for years in the '60s. 0:05:10.051,0:05:13.834 And we produced a number of people in law, all the way to the humanities. 0:05:13.834,0:05:16.467 We produced great artists. Beckett is our muse. 0:05:16.467,0:05:18.004 A lot of our students get into theater. 0:05:18.004,0:05:19.004 It's great work. 0:05:19.004,0:05:23.036 The problem that we faced was the same problem America continues to face -- 0:05:23.036,0:05:24.883 that students in the sciences and engineering, 0:05:24.883,0:05:26.994 black students were not succeeding. 0:05:26.994,0:05:28.745 But when I looked at the data, 0:05:28.745,0:05:32.077 what I found was that, quite frankly, students in general, 0:05:32.077,0:05:33.700 large numbers were not making it. 0:05:33.700,0:05:35.618 And as a result of that, 0:05:35.618,0:05:38.952 we decided to do something that would help, first of all, 0:05:38.952,0:05:43.169 the group at the bottom, African-American students, and then Hispanic students. 0:05:43.169,0:05:47.500 And Robert and Jane Meyerhoff, philanthropists, said, "We'd like to help." 0:05:47.500,0:05:50.953 Robert Meyerhoff said, "Why is it that everything I see on TV about black boys, 0:05:50.953,0:05:53.751 if it's not about basketball, is not positive? 0:05:53.751,0:05:56.383 I'd like to make a difference, to do something that's positive." 0:05:56.383,0:06:00.050 We married those ideas, and we created this Meyerhoff Scholars program. 0:06:00.050,0:06:02.119 And what is significant about the program 0:06:02.119,0:06:04.600 is that we learned a number of things. 0:06:04.600,0:06:05.952 And the question is this: 0:06:05.952,0:06:10.417 How is it that now we lead the country in producing African-Americans 0:06:10.417,0:06:15.267 who go on to complete Ph.D.'s in science and engineering and M.D./Ph.D.'s? 0:06:15.267,0:06:17.916 That's a big deal. Give me a hand for that. That's a big deal. 0:06:17.916,0:06:20.151 That's a big deal. It really is. 0:06:20.151,0:06:22.727 (Applause) 0:06:22.727,0:06:24.671 You see, most people don't realize 0:06:24.671,0:06:28.721 that it's not just minorities who don't do well in science and engineering. 0:06:28.721,0:06:32.338 Quite frankly, you're talking about Americans. 0:06:32.338,0:06:35.786 If you don't know it, while 20 percent of blacks and Hispanics 0:06:35.786,0:06:38.121 who begin with a major in science and engineering 0:06:38.121,0:06:40.273 will actually graduate in science and engineering, 0:06:40.273,0:06:43.827 only 32 percent of whites who begin with majors in those areas 0:06:43.827,0:06:46.485 actually succeed and graduate in those areas, 0:06:46.485,0:06:48.590 and only 42 percent of Asian-Americans. 0:06:48.590,0:06:51.201 And so, the real question is, what is the challenge? 0:06:51.201,0:06:53.588 Well a part of it, of course, is K-12. 0:06:53.588,0:06:55.537 We need to strengthen K-12. 0:06:55.537,0:06:57.833 But the other part has to do with the culture 0:06:57.833,0:07:00.493 of science and engineering on our campuses. 0:07:00.493,0:07:04.338 Whether you know it or not, large numbers of students with high SAT's 0:07:04.338,0:07:05.803 and large numbers of A.P. credits 0:07:05.803,0:07:08.505 who go to the most prestigious universities in our country 0:07:08.505,0:07:13.336 begin in pre-med or pre-engineering and engineering, and they end up changing their majors. 0:07:13.336,0:07:15.802 And the number one reason, we find, quite frankly, 0:07:15.802,0:07:18.752 is they did not do well in first year science courses. 0:07:18.752,0:07:22.535 In fact, we call first year science and engineering, typically around America, 0:07:22.535,0:07:24.669 weed-out courses or barrier courses. 0:07:24.669,0:07:26.437 How many of you in this audience know somebody 0:07:26.437,0:07:28.252 who started off in pre-med or engineering 0:07:28.252,0:07:30.137 and changed their major within a year or two? 0:07:30.137,0:07:31.935 It's an American challenge. Half of you in the room. 0:07:31.935,0:07:33.336 I know. I know. I know. 0:07:33.336,0:07:34.994 And what is interesting about that 0:07:34.994,0:07:37.704 is that so many students are smart and can do it. 0:07:37.704,0:07:39.970 We need to find ways of making it happen. 0:07:39.970,0:07:42.577 So what are the four things we did to help minority students 0:07:42.577,0:07:44.386 that now are helping students in general? 0:07:44.386,0:07:46.253 Number one: high expectations. 0:07:46.253,0:07:50.758 It takes an understanding of the academic preparation of students -- 0:07:50.758,0:07:53.102 their grades, the rigor of the course work, 0:07:53.102,0:07:55.553 their test-taking skills, their attitude, 0:07:55.553,0:07:58.278 the fire in their belly, the passion for the work, to make it. 0:07:58.278,0:08:02.519 And so doing things to help students prepare to be in that position, very important. 0:08:02.519,0:08:07.618 But equally important, it takes an understanding that it's hard work that makes the difference. 0:08:07.618,0:08:10.136 I don't care how smart you are or how smart you think you are. 0:08:10.136,0:08:12.503 Smart simply means you're ready to learn. 0:08:12.503,0:08:15.745 You're excited about learning and you want to ask good questions. 0:08:15.745,0:08:20.032 I. I. Rabi, a Nobel laureate, said that when he was growing up in New York, 0:08:20.032,0:08:22.578 all of his friends' parents would ask them 0:08:22.578,0:08:25.220 "What did you learn in school?" at the end of a day. 0:08:25.220,0:08:28.757 And he said, in contrast, his Jewish mother would say, 0:08:28.757,0:08:31.819 "Izzy, did you ask a good question today?" 0:08:31.819,0:08:34.518 And so high expectations have to do with curiosity 0:08:34.518,0:08:37.036 and encouraging young people to be curious. 0:08:37.036,0:08:38.552 And as a result of those high expectations, 0:08:38.552,0:08:41.219 we began to find students we wanted to work with 0:08:41.219,0:08:42.912 to see what could we do to help them, 0:08:42.912,0:08:45.452 not simply to survive in science and engineering, 0:08:45.452,0:08:48.386 but to become the very best, to excel. 0:08:48.386,0:08:50.203 Interestingly enough, an example: 0:08:50.203,0:08:55.105 One young man who earned a C in the first course and wanted to go on to med school, 0:08:55.105,0:08:57.220 we said, "We need to have you retake the course, 0:08:57.220,0:09:01.004 because you need a strong foundation if you're going to move to the next level." 0:09:01.004,0:09:04.035 Every foundation makes the difference in the next level. 0:09:04.035,0:09:05.176 He retook the course. 0:09:05.176,0:09:07.605 That young man went on to graduate from UMBC, 0:09:07.605,0:09:11.802 to become the first black to get the M.D./Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania. 0:09:11.802,0:09:13.008 He now works at Harvard. 0:09:13.008,0:09:15.455 Nice story. Give him a hand for that too. 0:09:15.455,0:09:17.885 (Applause) 0:09:17.886,0:09:20.381 Secondly, it's not about test scores only. 0:09:20.381,0:09:22.370 Test scores are important, but they're not the most important thing. 0:09:22.370,0:09:25.415 One young woman had great grades, but test scores were not as high. 0:09:25.415,0:09:27.464 But she had a factor that was very important. 0:09:27.464,0:09:30.712 She never missed a day of school, K-12. 0:09:30.712,0:09:32.133 There was fire in that belly. 0:09:32.133,0:09:36.257 That young woman went on, and she is today with an M.D./Ph.D. from Hopkins. 0:09:36.257,0:09:40.444 She's on the faculty, tenure track in psychiatry, Ph.D. in neuroscience. 0:09:40.475,0:09:45.286 She and her adviser have a patent on a second use of Viagra for diabetes patients. 0:09:45.286,0:09:47.771 Big hand for her. Big hand for her. 0:09:47.771,0:09:49.157 (Applause) 0:09:49.157,0:09:51.677 And so high expectations, very important. 0:09:51.677,0:09:54.536 Secondly, the idea of building community among the students. 0:09:54.536,0:09:57.303 You all know that so often in science and engineering 0:09:57.303,0:09:58.994 we tend to think cutthroat. 0:09:58.994,0:10:01.310 Students are not taught to work in groups. 0:10:01.310,0:10:03.202 And that's what we work to do with that group 0:10:03.202,0:10:04.705 to get them to understand each other, 0:10:04.705,0:10:07.328 to build trust among them, to support each other, 0:10:07.328,0:10:09.037 to learn how to ask good questions, 0:10:09.037,0:10:12.524 but also to learn how to explain concepts with clarity. 0:10:12.524,0:10:14.787 As you know, it's one thing to earn an A yourself, 0:10:14.787,0:10:16.912 it's another thing to help someone else do well. 0:10:16.912,0:10:20.827 And so to feel that sense of responsibility makes all the difference in the world. 0:10:20.827,0:10:23.774 So building community among those students, very important. 0:10:23.774,0:10:28.578 Third, the idea of, it takes researchers to produce researchers. 0:10:28.578,0:10:31.107 Whether you're talking about artists producing artists 0:10:31.107,0:10:34.022 or you're talking about people getting into the social sciences, 0:10:34.022,0:10:38.869 whatever the discipline -- and especially in science and engineering, as in art, for example -- 0:10:38.869,0:10:41.672 you need scientists to pull the students into the work. 0:10:41.672,0:10:44.412 And so our students are working in labs regularly. 0:10:44.412,0:10:46.786 And one great example that you'll appreciate: 0:10:46.786,0:10:49.846 During a snowstorm in Baltimore several years ago, 0:10:49.846,0:10:53.466 the guy on our campus with this Howard Hughes Medical Institute grant 0:10:53.466,0:10:57.890 literally came back to work in his lab after several days, 0:10:57.890,0:11:01.183 and all these students had refused to leave the lab. 0:11:01.183,0:11:03.267 They had food they had packed out. 0:11:03.267,0:11:04.582 They were in the lab working, 0:11:04.582,0:11:08.583 and they saw the work, not as schoolwork, but as their lives. 0:11:08.583,0:11:10.495 They knew they were working on AIDS research. 0:11:10.495,0:11:13.703 They were looking at this amazing protein design. 0:11:13.703,0:11:18.036 And what was interesting was each one of them focused on that work. 0:11:18.036,0:11:20.202 And he said, "It doesn't get any better than that." 0:11:20.202,0:11:22.287 And then finally, if you've got the community 0:11:22.287,0:11:25.900 and you've got the high expectations and you've got researchers producing researchers, 0:11:25.900,0:11:28.788 you have to have people who are willing as faculty 0:11:28.788,0:11:31.851 to get involved with those students, even in the classroom. 0:11:31.851,0:11:34.299 I'll never forget a faculty member calling the staff and saying, 0:11:34.299,0:11:36.744 "I've got this young man in class, a young black guy, 0:11:36.744,0:11:39.784 and he seems like he's just not excited about the work. 0:11:39.784,0:11:42.019 He's not taking notes. We need to talk to him." 0:11:42.019,0:11:45.891 What was significant was that the faculty member was observing every student 0:11:45.891,0:11:48.807 to understand who was really involved and who was not 0:11:48.807,0:11:51.174 and was saying, "Let me see how I can work with them. 0:11:51.174,0:11:52.411 Let me get the staff to help me out." 0:11:52.411,0:11:53.563 It was that connecting. 0:11:53.563,0:11:58.495 That young man today is actually a faculty member M.D./Ph.D. in neuroengineering at Duke. 0:11:58.495,0:11:59.707 Give him a big hand for that. 0:11:59.707,0:12:01.703 (Applause) 0:12:01.703,0:12:06.523 And so the significance is that we have now developed this model 0:12:06.523,0:12:10.688 that is helping us, not only finally with evaluation, assessing what works. 0:12:10.688,0:12:14.120 And what we learned was that we needed to think about redesigning courses. 0:12:14.120,0:12:16.661 And so we redesigned chemistry, we redesigned physics. 0:12:16.661,0:12:20.322 But now we are looking at redesigning the humanities and social sciences. 0:12:20.322,0:12:22.869 Because so many students are bored in class. 0:12:22.869,0:12:24.049 Do you know that? 0:12:24.049,0:12:25.995 Many students, K-12 and in universities, 0:12:25.995,0:12:28.500 don't want to just sit there and listen to somebody talk. 0:12:28.500,0:12:29.870 They need to be engaged. 0:12:29.870,0:12:33.320 And so we have done -- if you look at our website at the Chemistry Discovery Center, 0:12:33.320,0:12:35.285 you'll see people coming from all over the country 0:12:35.285,0:12:37.864 to look at how we are redesigning courses, 0:12:37.864,0:12:41.355 having an emphasis on collaboration, use of technology, 0:12:41.355,0:12:44.585 using problems out of our biotech companies on our campus, 0:12:44.585,0:12:46.615 and not giving students the theories, 0:12:46.615,0:12:48.847 but having them struggle with those theories. 0:12:48.847,0:12:52.506 And it's working so well that throughout our university system in Maryland, 0:12:52.506,0:12:54.547 more and more courses are being redesigned. 0:12:54.547,0:12:56.381 It's called academic innovation. 0:12:56.381,0:12:57.586 And what does all of that mean? 0:12:57.586,0:13:00.429 It means that now, not just in science and engineering, 0:13:00.429,0:13:04.537 we now have programs in the arts, in the humanities, in the social sciences, 0:13:04.537,0:13:09.129 in teacher education, even particularly for women in I.T. 0:13:09.129,0:13:13.216 If you don't know it, there's been a 79-percent decline 0:13:13.216,0:13:17.334 in the number of women majoring in computer science just since 2000. 0:13:17.334,0:13:20.647 And what I'm saying is that what will make the difference 0:13:20.647,0:13:23.202 will be building community among students, 0:13:23.202,0:13:26.198 telling young women, young minority students and students in general, 0:13:26.198,0:13:27.447 you can do this work. 0:13:27.447,0:13:30.717 And most important, giving them a chance to build that community 0:13:30.717,0:13:32.880 with faculty pulling them into the work 0:13:32.880,0:13:35.398 and our assessing what works and what does not work. 0:13:35.398,0:13:39.246 Most important, if a student has a sense of self, 0:13:39.246,0:13:42.130 it is amazing how the dreams and the values 0:13:42.130,0:13:44.119 can make all the difference in the world. 0:13:44.119,0:13:47.749 When I was a 12-year-old child in the jail in Birmingham, 0:13:47.749,0:13:51.013 I kept thinking, "I wonder what my future could be." 0:13:51.013,0:13:56.798 I had no idea that it was possible for this little black boy in Birmingham 0:13:56.798,0:14:01.763 to one day be president of a university that has students from 150 countries, 0:14:01.763,0:14:04.119 where students are not there just to survive, 0:14:04.119,0:14:08.120 where they love learning, where they enjoy being the best, 0:14:08.120,0:14:10.661 where they will one day change the world. 0:14:10.661,0:14:14.036 Aristotle said, "Excellence is never an accident. 0:14:14.036,0:14:20.031 It is the result of high intention, sincere effort and intelligent execution. 0:14:20.031,0:14:23.963 It represents the wisest option among many alternatives." 0:14:23.963,0:14:26.297 And then he said something that gives me goosebumps. 0:14:26.297,0:14:31.944 He said, "Choice, not chance, determines your destiny." 0:14:31.944,0:14:39.506 Choice, not chance, determines your destiny, dreams and values. 0:14:39.506,0:14:41.440 Thank you all very much. 0:14:41.440,0:14:52.342 (Applause)