Economic Development is our Mission

We have begun our celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Thomas Green Clemson.

As you read his story elsewhere in this issue, you will learn that, even today, the remarkable life of Clemson University’s founder provides us with a template for the truly educated person. Mr. Clemson was the “total package,” as today’s students might say.

A transplanted “Yankee” born in Philadelphia, he was educated in the United States and in the universities and salons of Paris and Brussels. He was a scientist, a farmer and a diplomat who also loved and participated in the arts. He painted, played the violin and wrote music.

President Barker's sketch Mr. Clemson understood that scientific education was the key to economic progress and prosperity in the poverty-stricken South Carolina of the 1880s. In the “high seminary of learning” he envisioned, intellectual development would be forever wedded to practical knowledge and economic development.

His wisdom guides us today.

Mr. Clemson’s will is the foundational document of Clemson University. It is to our institution what the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution are to our nation.

I invite you to read the full text online at www.clemson.edu/TGC200/. I do that periodically, and I find it a humbling and inspiring experience.

I also believe that, in 2007, our university has finally begun to realize the fullness of Thomas Green Clemson’s vision.

In this issue, you will learn that Clemson faculty have been awarded a campus chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s oldest and most prestigious academic honor society. This is an important milestone for us because it recognizes the excellence of our undergraduate programs in the humanities, arts and sciences.

The learned, artistic Mr. Clemson would be proud.

Another story documents progress toward our long-range goal of providing an international experience for every Clemson student. As one of our globe-trotting undergraduates observed: “Our world is demanding that we think more like global citizens.”

Consider this question: Can you be a truly educated person in the 21st century without traveling abroad, experiencing foreign cultures and seeing for yourself how interdependent we are in a global economy?

Clemson The answer is no. Mr. Clemson, the world traveler and diplomat, understood that way back in the 19th century.

As to statewide public service and economic development, recent milestones include:

• Dedication of the $10 million Timken Technology Center at the Clemson University International Center for Automotive Research (CU-ICAR);
• Rededication of the former Clemson research park near I-85 as the Clemson University Advanced Materials Center, in partnership with Anderson County;
• Approval by the state Budget & Control Board to provide $10.3 million in bond funding, and by the city of North Charleston to transfer land, for the Clemson University Restoration Institute.

These centers are direct descendants of our founder’s vision, as expressed in his will. When he wrote about programs “intended to benefit agricultural and mechanical industries,” Mr. Clemson authored South Carolina’s first economic development plan.

“I trust that I do not exaggerate the importance of such an institution for developing the material resources of the State,” he added.

He did not exaggerate. Clemson’s historical role cannot be overstated in developing and providing expert manpower to the state’s agriculture and forest industries, textiles, fibers, chemicals, construction, bricks and ceramics, packaging and many more.

Statewide economic development is not “mission creep” for Clemson. Economic development is our mission, and always has been. If the research universities don’t now build a knowledge economy for South Carolina, who will?

Clemson has no ambitions to build a law school, or a medical school, or a gigantic student body on multiple residential campuses. These are, frankly, hallmarks of most of the institutions ahead of us in the ranks of top-30 national public universities. We have determined that is not our way.

Clemson’s way is to be the best at what we do best, which is undergraduate teaching and targeted, highly focused research, which demands outstanding graduate programs as well.

Our commitment is to limit undergraduate enrollment, control class size and maintain the special relationship that students have with teachers, and alumni have with their alma mater. Our challenge is not only to find a way to balance economic development and intellectual development, but to design relationships and structures that allow them to reinforce and strengthen each other.

One way we plan to do that is through undergraduate research and creative inquiry. There are some things you just cannot learn by listening or reading, or from someone else’s experience. Some things you must learn by doing and discovering for yourself.

Even our freshmen can make contributions to our important work of research, service and economic development as they learn the skills to be questioning, knowledge-seeking, self-educating adults. We must ready them for a lifetime of learning.

This is a “Big Idea” worthy of Thomas Green Clemson himself. Yet it is entirely consistent with the path to the top 20 that we have chosen — a path based on commitment to students, focus, tenacity, service … and big ideas.

Clemson is taking an unconventional route to the top 20. Because when we get there, we want to make sure Clemson will still be Clemson.