The future of Husker athletics has dominated much of the discussion around U. Nebraska-Lincoln’s recent move to the Big 10 Conference, but sports aren’t the only way conference realignment will affect UNL.
By moving to the Big 10, UNL will be joining an athletic conference with one of the most prestigious academic reputations in the country.
Five of the schools in the Big 10 are ranked in the top 50 of U.S. News & World Report’s annual list of top colleges and universities, and the conference is responsible for almost 20 percent of all engineering doctorate degrees and 25 percent of all agricultural doctorate degrees awarded nationally.
The athletic affects of UNL’s transition to the Big 10 received much of the attention after the University of Nebraska Board of Regents approved the move, but university administrators have been talking up the academic benefits as well. At the board’s June 11 meeting, NU President J.B. Milliken listed the Big 10’s academic achievements as one reason he was anticipating UNL’s inclusion in the conference.
“We look forward to joining an extraordinary group of institutions that have demonstrated strength in athletics, a loyal and dedicated fan base and an exceptional level of academic achievement,” Milliken said.
The Big 10’s academic achievements include associations with a number of large-scale academic organizations. All Big 10 schools are also members of the Association of American Universities, a collection of 63 of the country’s top research universities that works to improve that status of academic research.
The Big 10 is currently the only conference to have all its members in the AAU. The Big 12 had seven AAU members before the nation-wide conference realignment began, and is now down to five after the departures of UNL and the University of Colorado.
While UNL is already an AAU university, Chancellor Harvey Perlman said the prestige associated with being in a conference full of fellow AAU members will still benefit UNL.
“It’s of considerable importance when trying to recruit faculty,” Perlman said.
Joining the Big 10 also gets UNL membership in the conference’s Committee on Institutional Cooperation, an organization comprised of the Big 10 schools and the University of Chicago that works to share resources among member universities. UNL accepted an invitation to join the CIC on Thursday, and will officially join the committee on July 1, 2011.
“This is an exciting time in higher education, and the CIC is moving fast on many fronts,” said Barbara McFadden Allen, director of the CIC. “We’re looking forward to working with the university leadership to weave UNL into our many initiatives, projects and programs.”
Membership in the CIC will give UNL access to a library exchange program with the other universities, and will allow students to easily transfer credit from one CIC school to another. Members also participate in a scholarship exchange program, which allows universities to get consults from or even borrow faculty from other CIC schools.
CIC members received around 12 percent of all federal research funding last year. Some Big 10 schools, such as Penn State University, the last school to join the Big 10 before UNL, have seen noticeable improvements in research funding since joining the Big 10 and the CIC.
In 1990, the year before Penn State joined the Big 10, the university received around $137 million in federal research funding. By 2009, Penn State’s federal research funding had more than tripled, coming in at $446 million for the year.
The new conference affiliation will also give UNL the chance to promote itself across a wider area with the conference’s Big 10 Network. The network is available across the country, and along with athletics displays advertisements for its universities’ academic operations.
“This will display across the Big 10 and across the country the value and quality of faculty we have,” Perlman said.
Although leaving the Big 12 will put UNL in a new position with things like research funding and faculty recruiting, Perlman said it’s ultimately the right move for UNL’s academics.
“I think we are clearly aligned with the Big 10 on the academic side of things,” Perlman said.