By Tim Woods
Tribune-Herald staff writer
Baylor University Chancellor Robert B. Sloan Jr., who was president of the
university for 10 years till he stepped down in 2005, was named president of
Houston Baptist University last week, effective Sept. 1.
Sloan sat down with the Tribune-Herald to discuss his time at Baylor
that spanned 27 years, including his undergraduate studies. The former president
discussed everything ranging from his proudest achievements at the school to
the criticism that came his way near the end of his presidential tenure.
Q: How do you feel you’ve changed since 1995, the year you became
Baylor’s president?
A: Well, I think I’ve changed a lot. I think my basic
commitment to excellence and to be a distinctively Christian institution has
been constant, but I have learned so much about the financial operations of
an institution. That has been a great education. But how things work on a financial
model for higher education — things like student recruiting, the endowment,
what we call annual gifts, tuition discounts, scholarship programs — how
all those things play into one another, I just knew so little about that when
I started. I had never been a vice president and had only been a dean for a
year and a half, so there was a lot of learning. Something else I hadn’t
thought about had to do with student life and the student experience and the
connection between living and learning. The residential experience, I think,
is of paramount importance. You know, where you live and are you happy there?
Is it accessible to the campus? Do you have good friends? Is there a social
life? You could enjoy writing and journalism and the things you do but, my
goodness, if your work space isn’t good, you don’t have good colleagues
or you don’t like the city, then you’re out of there. And that’s
the way it is for students.
Q: What lessons did you learn during your 10 years as Baylor president
that you will take with you to HBU?
A: Several things. One thing of importance for an institution
is the importance of having a vision that everybody participates in. Another
is the importance of retaining a proven faculty. There’s just no substitute
for that. Another is the importance of recruiting students. I didn’t
realize that when I first started as a college president. I just thought it
was something that happened naturally — you know, students apply and
they’re here. Boy, it’s hard work and it’s vital. It drives
so much. It drives the academic reputation of the school.
Q: Baylor’s skyline and climate have changed dramatically in
recent years. What is your proudest achievement from your tenure as Baylor’s
president?
A: I would say Baylor 2012 because so much is incorporated
within that document. Everything from the character of the school, the academics
of the school, the residential experience, the buildings, athletics, the endowment.
The process of thinking through all that and getting it down, and then letting
that guide the process of what you do — I think that helps everybody.
It helps you make financial decisions. By the time you have the question, you
know the answer because you’ve already got a guideline.
Q: What building are you most proud of?
A: You know, you’re going to pin me down to one and
it’s so hard. I am simultaneously proudest of the Science Building, the
Baylor North Village and, this one might surprise you, but the Student Life
Center. The Student Life Center was the first building built after I became
president. Those three building changed the dynamics, they’re not just
buildings. The Student Life Center changed the whole traffic flow of the university
and it made it a place where kids wanted to stay on the weekends. It gave them
something to do. The North Village, that changed the dynamic, too, because
it was a paradigm shift for the last four decades for Baylor, to come, as it
were, back to campus. The Science Building just exemplifies all the academic
aspect. Another thing I’ll give you is the whole riverfront athletic
corridor. That was an entire complex done — you know, baseball, softball,
soccer, tennis — that whole complex was just a paradigm shift for Baylor
athletics.
Q: On the flip side, what was your biggest disappointment at Baylor?
A: Well, I didn’t stay on as president as long as I
thought I would and there were still things on the academic front — I
mean, there are always buildings to be built. I could give you five right now
that were on the docket to do, but that can still be done. On the academic
side, there were more things. To continue hiring the outstanding faculty that
had been coming to Baylor. That have been, actually, I don’t want to
make it sound like it’s past tense. One of the things I’ve learned
over the years is that it sometimes does not cost — on the academic side
of the house, you can get a lot of bang for the buck academically... For not
a lot of money, you can make an enormous shift academically. There’s
some programs, some things in athletics, that cost tons of money. They’re
fun and they’re wonderful and they can greatly influence the morale,
student spirit, the alumni, but on the academic side, relatively speaking,
it doesn’t cost as much to make as big a difference. When it comes to
making sure that the faculty groups that want to do symposia, that they have
the money to do that. Creating new faculty positions, relatively speaking,
is not that expensive compared to so many of the other things that we do. Professional
development, for faculty who have been here for a long time, I think that’s
very important. The upside of a place like Baylor is that people stay for a
long time and people in academics can stay in academia their whole career.
One of the things that can happen, though, when you stay doing the same thing
for a long time, you can get out of date with your own skill set, with your
own cutting edge learning, and you should never allow your faculty to lose
their passion, become disinterested or feel like they have lost the ability
to stay at the forefront of their field. I wish I had helped the university
find more ways to put more money into programs for faculty development, particularly
for those who have been here 10-plus years. The other faculty that come here,
they’ve just come out of research programs and they’re at the cutting
edge of their disciplines. But for those of us, and I can put myself in this
category, after you’ve been teaching for 10 years, you need renewal more
than the youngsters.
Q: Where do you see Baylor going from here?
A: I see Baylor continuing to make tremendous progress. I’m
so pleased that the regents, at the last meeting, made clear the ongoing commitment
that they have to Baylor 2012. And President Lilley has made abundantly clear,
publicly and privately, his commitment to Baylor 2012. President Lilley said
such nice things when it was announced that I was going to HBU and he specifically
mentioned Baylor 2012 and that’s just enormously gratifying to me. I
see the direction of the regents and I see the direction and commitment of
the president and I couldn’t be happier about that. I think you will
continue to see these developments. The Brooks North Village, that’s
a continuation of one of the major imperatives, to build a truly residential
campus. You can go on down the list, but numerous things that were talked about
at the regent’s retreat last summer, it’s clear they’ve got
their commitments.
Q: There were some rocky times near the end of your presidential tenure
at Baylor, including a division between some of the faculty and your administration.
When you stepped down early in 2005, you said that it was needed to enable
the healing of that division. Do you believe that has happened since you resigned?
A: I do think there has been progress. I think you see that
on numerous fronts. I think, again, a lot of those things — the divisions
and rough spots — were partly due to the manner of implementation (of
Baylor 2012). I think I could have been a better leader implementing Baylor
2012. But it’s also fair to say that some of the divisions are not healed
because they didn’t have to do with the manner of implementation, they
had to do with the substance of the issues themselves. There were, and continue
to be, foundational disagreements as to where Baylor should go and those disagreements
continue to be there. I think the temperature of the rhetoric has cooled and
I think you have to give the faculty and Dr. Lilley and the regents a lot of
credit for that because, again, the temperature has gone down. But there are
still some substantive disagreements about the direction of the university.
However, I’m gratified because I think while there are those who disagree,
what’s clear to me is that the president and the regents and large numbers
of the Baylor family — the students, a large faction of the faculty and,
I think, the majority of alumni — are in agreement about the general
direction and about the issues themselves. But that’s the nature of change.
When you have change, it is always tough at first. When you go through kind
of a catharsis and you go through some controversy, sometimes the controversy
can be well-handled, sometimes it’s not. I could have done a better job
of leading during a time of controversy, and wish I had, but I don’t
have any regrets about the overall direction. That’s the nature of change.
Institutions are complex in nature and all of us are resistant to change.
Q: How difficult was it for you, personally, and for your family to
hear criticism of you and your administration at the end of your time as Baylor’s
president?
A: It was very difficult. In public, of course, in a leadership
role you do your best to maintain an even keel and not to present a troubled
face, publicly. But, of course, it’s always very difficult personally
and you look for ways to deal with that and to cope with that. I coped with
prayer, with close friends, with family members and with remembering your deepest
values and commitments. With exercise, with sleep. You do all of those important
things to help you cope with it. But yes, it was very difficult and at times
very painful because the rhetoric did get out of hand. I saw instances where
disagreement with the vision itself got personalized, so that people sometimes
take their substantive disagreements and turn that toward a person and that
hurts. Yes, it was painful for my family, as well. But I wouldn’t want
the paragraph to end with that statement because it was also good for us as
a family. Painful experiences are also learning experiences and I told my children
publicly at a banquet that, on the one hand, I was very sorry for what they
had gone through but that I wouldn’t trade a single second of it. In
retrospect, I’d never want it for them, but I wouldn’t take back
a single bit of it.
Q: Did it have a galvanizing effect?
A: It’s just a learning experience. You learn more about
yourself, you learn about human nature, you learn how people react, you learn
from your mistakes, you learn how to cope in times of stress. Our children
were able to go through something very traumatic over a two or three year period
early in life and I’m thankful for what they will have learned from that.
What it really was, in a mysterious way, was painful, yet also a gift. And
again, I wouldn’t want the paragraph to end there, either. We love Baylor
University. We are deeply committed to this place. It’s our alma mater.
We believe the Lord has led us to Houston Baptist University. We’re excited
about that. It’s an opportunity to do things that can be done in a distinctive
place, but we will always love Baylor. We’ll always be grateful for the
thousands of friends and experiences.
Q: Given your love for Baylor, do you have your eye on possibly coming
back to be president again?
A: You know, I don’t expect that ever to happen. We
certainly expect to come back here for homecomings and to be with friends and
to be always related to and supportive of the university. I learned a long
time ago that God always has surprising things in store for us, but that’s
not something that I look to or anticipate in any way. We’ve gone to
Houston Baptist because we think that’s where the Lord wants us and I
told the people there yesterday that I expect to be there until we professionally
retire. I’m 57 years old, so if I were there as president for 15 years,
that would make me 72 and that’s my expectation.
Q: Were you happy in your role as chancellor?
A: Happy, yes, but not completely fulfilled, honestly. It
was very generous on the part of many of the regents to want me to be chancellor
and generous on the part of the regents to provide that 12 months of sabbatic.
And I’ve used three or four months of it, something like that. But the
rest has been good, having less of a stressful day-to-day life, that’s
been good. The sabbatic months have been good, the reading. And I’ve
enjoyed continuing to work on the Bush library, that has been very fulfilling,
working with Tommye Lou Davis. But I knew from the very beginning that I wouldn’t
be satisfied to have that kind of a job. I didn’t know if it would be
six months or three years, but I knew that at some point I’d want to
go back to, well, to a more stressful life. You have to have a little challenge.
And mostly it’s a question of what you love doing.
Q: How has your relationship with Dr. Lilley been?
A: It’s been excellent. He’s been very gracious
to me and I will always be grateful. For example, for the comments that he
made that were used by some of the press and that he sent the regents a note
telling them that I was interviewing at Houston Baptist, he made a comment
there that was very affirming. I will always be grateful for that. He’s
been nothing but kind, gracious and very supportive. And very understanding.
He knows what a pressure cooker a college presidency can be and so, as I’ve
taken some time off using the sabbatic, he’s been very gracious about
that.
Q: Some people might consider going from Baylor to Houston Baptist
a step backwards. How do you address that mentality?
A: I can understand people saying that because we do measure
professional things sometimes by the institutions that we’re a part of.
But Baylor was a great institution before I got here and it will be a great
institution after we leave. I’ve been privileged to be a part of Baylor’s
history. But it’s also really challenging to me to go to someplace that
wants to change. That’s been their thinking — they’re so
young, they’ve always embraced change. We all do it, but you can’t
measure things in terms of size alone. I think what you have to measure by
is the value it adds. I have to remind myself that I have to have the right
criteria for evaluating the nature of a move or a step. You just measure things
by the value it’s added. In our lives, we also try to listen deeply to
the sense of divine calling.
Q: Do you feel like you’ve been called?
A: Absolutely. I think I was called to Baylor University and
I think that time here came to an end and I think that we have a new assignment
from our Lord. It’s different and it’s kind of hard to compare
things because it is so different.
Q: How tough is it to leave Baylor and Waco, a place where you’ve
spent nearly half of your life?
A: It’s hard. There’s no question about it, it’s
difficult. With friends and 27 years of our lives invested here. In so many
different ways. The students, faculty, being president and chancellor, you
get to know every garden and every sidewalk, the people and the institution’s
traditions. One of the things that makes it hardest is that it’s change
and being here has been a great comfort zone. The Lord is moving us out of
our comfort zone and in many ways I suppose it’s something of a compliment
to be entrusted with a new responsibility and I’m very humbled by the
trust that the Houston Baptist faculty and trustees have put in me.
Q: What will you miss most about Baylor and Waco?
A: I think it’s the familiarity. You know everybody.
You know the rhythms of life. You know the traditions. C.S. Lewis said that’s
why he doesn’t like for worship leaders to change their forms of worship
so much because in the familiar you have the opportunity to not be distracted
by the externals. But you’re not asking about my theology of worship.
But, that’s the valuable thing about home is that you can go to the same
spot and know these people are your friends and your family and that’s
what makes change so difficult. But, I think faith involves change and that’s
the calling of God. Faith requires us to pick up and move and to grow and not
be captive by our allegiances. That’s what makes it hard for the Sloan
family is that it’s change for us, too, but we’re embracing it.
On the other side, when we’ve been to Houston in recent weeks, visiting
with people, the encouragement and the affirmation — we do have many
friends there already. And that number has grown rapidly in the last few weeks.
We’ll settle in and it’ll be fun. You just have to look at it as
an adventure.
Q: What is Robert Sloan’s legacy at Baylor?
A: I don’t know. I guess I’d have to say two things
about it. From a historical point of view, that story is yet to be written.
And ultimately, even after the historians write the story, there is one who
has the final word and what the Lord says on the last day is the only word
that really matters. We’ll wait to get that judgment then.
Q: Given that there were so many critics at the end of your presidential
tenure, does it give you a sense of gratification to see Baylor 2012 appear
to be thriving?
A: Of course. We are very grateful that many things of Baylor
2012 have proven out and worked well and that the president and the board are
continuing to push it forward. That’s very gratifying. It’s gratifying
not because there was criticism, well, maybe partly so, but really because
with or without the criticism there was risk involved. To have progress, you
have to have change. Not all change is progress, but there is no progress without
change and there was a certain risk involved with raising the tuition. Was
that going to work? Offering more scholarships, borrowing money, building the
buildings we built, making the investments in athletics, hiring the faculty — would
it pay off? There was a lot of risk in all that and not every risk in life
works, but several of them have. And I’ll tell you, the financial model
is working and I’m very gratified by that. David Brooks deserves a lot
of credit for that. Even after the regents voted to raise tuition dramatically
and go to a flat rate, there was such a kick back from that. And that didn’t
work overnight. That took a while. Of course we had an economic downturn and
9/11 and the timing of it was a bad situation. And then other things came along,
obviously, to challenge the financial situation, but over time student demand
is there. The investment in a great science building and student housing and
the university is so successful in athletics — that has built demand
and that’s gratifying.
Q: What are your departing words to the Baylor family?
A: God bless Baylor. We love Baylor and we love Waco. Our
greatest passion for Waco is that it be willing to take some risks and to grow
and develop. For Baylor, there should be no question, historically or in terms
of our obligation, as to what Baylor’s identity is. Certain features
of it really are not even debatable. Legally and historically, Baylor was founded
as a Christian institution in the Baptist tradition and being faithful to that
should not be up for grabs. Having a faculty and staff that have those commitments
should always be of primary concern because it’s the people that really
are the institution and what the faculty and staff are determines the experience
of the students. Baylor should always seek people that don’t merely accept
her identity, but embrace it.