Florida State University’s new president Richard McCullough is looking at what academic programs could strengthen the college’s standing and potentially help it break into the prestigious Association of American Universities (AAU).
During a Q & A session with reporters today, McCullough said he sees the MagLab as a candidate for building more robust academic programs at FSU. He’s also looking at science, math, and life sciences as areas of potential growth.
“This is not leaving out any of the social sciences or humanities, but these are the things that really jump out at me as a person who’s headed up research organizations at two major universities,” McCullough said.
He said the AAU looks at three major areas: research, entrepreneurship, and student success.
“There’s lots of room to continue to grow in entrepreneurship with our College of Entrepreneurship—increase the number of startup companies that are coming out of the university,” McCullough said.
McCullough said he also plans to focus on boosting research funds. Previously, he talked about applying for more research grants from the National Institutes of Health. But McCullough said the third area the AAU looks at, student success, will be a challenge to maintain amid the COVID-19 pandemic this fall.
“To make sure that [students] are practicing social distancing and masking, things we would strongly recommend they do to try to keep us safe so that we don’t have to go back to living that sequestered life when we went through COVID A, alpha,” McCullough said.
According to FSU’s COVID-19 case statistics dashboard, 31 students and three employees tested positive for the coronavirus last week. McCullough expects as more students return, there will be a rise in coronavirus cases. But he hopes that won’t last for long. He also said the college is working on providing quarantine space for students who test positive for the coronavirus.
“We don’t have a lot of space, as you know, but we’re working on trying to see if we can expand the spaces that we have—that’s a very big challenge for us right now,” McCullough said.
Previously, FSU said it would not be providing on-campus isolation space for students during the fall semester due to housing being at full capacity.
