Martin Jischke
From Rofflehaus
Gopher is about love.
--Martin Jischke
Martin Jischke was ISU's president from 1991 to 2000.
He received his B.S. in physics at Illinois Institute of Technology and his M.S. and PhD in Aerospace Engineering from MIT. After joining Oklahoma University's engineering program in 1968, he became dean of the college in 1981. In 1986, he went on to serve as chancellor at Missouri-Rolla until he became ISU's president. In 2000, he left to become president at Purdue.
Highly admired for his fundraising skills. Highly derided for his poor leadership in other areas. Perhaps it is fitting that his name adorns an extravagant building that broke the naming rules in the interest of money, serves a highly pretentious and elitist program, and replaced a smaller but more well-loved home.
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[edit] Overview of Term
During his term in office, he managed to successfully alienate both the students and the faculty - to the point that after he left, in a rare moment, the IRHA, GSB, and Faculty Senate all voted to protest the Regents giving him the honor of a building named after him. He curbed free speech to a small square in front of the library (not big enough to lay down in), and during the last three years of his term, tuition nearly DOUBLED.
The only people who really liked Jischke were the rich alums, but that's because he started the trend of allowing them to purchase buildings and schools (and, no doubt, had he not left for Purdue, he would have eventually renamed the colleges and university!)
[edit] Accomplishments
Dramatically increased donations to the school. The Iowa State Foundation had $160 million in assets before his presidency; after, it had $500 million. In one fundraising program under his leadership, Campaign Destiny, raised $458 million, which was far beyond the original goal of $300 million.
He created learning communities, the Hixon Scholars, and the President's Leadership Class.
[edit] Controversies
[edit] Free Speech
Jischke decreed that demonstrations and other free speech activities could happen without prior approval at the Edward S. Allen Free Speech Area, south of the Hub. All other areas were restricted or conditional speech areas, examples of the latter being the steps of Beardshear Hall or Carrie Chapman Catt Hall's Plaza of Heroines, the use of which required persons to fill out an Activity Information and Authorization Form, available at the Student Activities Center. The restrictions were not content-based, administrators claimed, meaning that they would restrict speech if it caused a disturbance, not because of what the speech actually contained.
Jischke's move did not endear him to activists and defenders of the First Amendment, and his future decisions (see below) were always viewed as being made without concern to other views. The concept of the free speech zone was repealed upon President Gregory Geoffroy taking office.
[edit] The September 29th Movement
On September 29, 1995, it was revealed that ISU heroic alumnae Carrie Chapman Catt made perceived racist remarks. In October of that year, Old Botany was renamed to Carrie Chapman Catt Hall, sparking protests and a letter-writing campaign to President Jischke. Jischke was seen as a stonewaller, only meeting with the protestors once under confidential circumstances. His adminsitration's reluctance to confront the issue only exacerbated what could've been a defusable controversy. Ultimately, he supported the naming of Catt Hall.
To be fair, the naming decision was not Jischke's decison, but the decision of the Board of Regents. And the majority of students didn't want the name changed] or didn't give a piss.
[edit] Dry Veishea
After the 1997 slaying of Uri Sellers at Adelante during VEISHEA, Jischke set an ultimatum: "eliminate excessive alcohol on campus or eliminate Veishea." Though the murder of Sellers happened off-campus and involved non-students, Jischke reasoned that "we have to fix our own house before we worry about everything else" and "everything that is wrong with Veishea, all the problems point to alcohol."
Student leaders, for the most part, were in favor of having VEISHEA be dry rather than be completely cancelled. The city also agreed VEISHEA was out of control, but questioned whether making the campus dry was worthwile, asking "If the university says no alcohol on campus, does it just move out into the streets and become a more difficult problem to control?"
GSB voted to support Dry VEISHEA, as did IRHA and the Panhellenic Council.
Some student leaders said that VEISHEA would be a failure. But VEISHEA went on, no riots occurred, and students still participated. In subsequent years, though, students became more and more indignant at having to renew the pledge, and Jischke continued to set the same ultimatium.
Whether VEISHEA being made dry made the festival safer is up to debate. Theriot in 2004 showed there was no shortage of students having access to alcohol or any less willingness to be destructive as a result of not being able to drink on campus, and some say since all the drinking was concentrated at the bars and off-campus parties near Welch, that created a clusterfuck of people at the location of the riot in 2004.
[edit] Conflict of interest with Banker's Trust
In 1993, Jischke joined the board of directors for Banker's Trust of Iowa, a position held by Jischke's predecessor and one he never tried to hide. However, in 1997, when all of ISU's money went from being in five different bank accounts to being all under the control of Banker's Trust, which had never held ISU's money before, suspicions were raised, particularly by student Ed Snook who started a webpage of objections. Snook also was suspicious that Jischke appointed Banker's Trust's executive vice president, Robert De Waay to the board of directors for the ISU Research Park.
Jischke and the administration responded by saying that the president's office had nothing to do with the change in banks, that it was all done through the Purchasing Department and was approved by the Regents. Jischke said he excused himself from any decisions that would create a potential conflict of interest.
[edit] Naming buildings
Other buildings: names were sold for sizeable donations. Whoops.
On July 19, 2000, the Board of Regents approved naming the yet-to-be-built honors building after Jischke, who was then still ISU's president. This raised several kinds of protest: one, many students and faculty disliked him, and two, there is a rule stating that no one can be nominated to have a building named after him/her until five years after he/she has left Iowa State. Since this naming was shoehorned in the summer when everyone was gone, many suspected the Regents did it then to avoid opposition. When the Faculty Senate tried to raise protest in 2002, the Regents firmly smacked it down, saying that the issue had been decided and it would be awkward to rescind an honor already hastily given.
Ironically enough, Jischke had made a statement in 1996 supporting the five-year rule because it "permits a period of reflection on the accomplishments of the retired individual and allows the institution to reach an appropriate decision on whether to honor an individual with the naming of a building or street". This was the third time in ISU's history when the five-year rule was broken (Parks Library and Lagomarcino Hall being the other exceptions). Frederiksen Court semi-broke the rules because Frederiksen was given consideration soon after he retired.
IRHA, GSB, and Faculty Senate all voted to protest the naming decision.
[edit] News articles
- The article, SoapBoxing with Jischke, in the 04/09, 1999 edition of the Iowa State Daily is still unavailable due to a change in the Daily's website and general laziness of Rofflehaus contributors. If you'd like to help fix a broken link like this, check out Template talk:ISUD to find out how. Thank you for your patience. (D: 04/09/1999), a SoapBoxing report
