NSU Horizons Fall 2011

12 horizons Single-shared vision n Horizons The vision statement for 2020, is not, as you say, your vision alone, but a collective, single-shared vision. Can you talk about the importance of this vision for NSU? n hanbury No organization can ever succeed unless there is a single-shared vision throughout the organization that everyone understands and has had an opportunity to have input on. NSU’s vision is, by 2020, through excellence and innovations in teaching, research, service, and learning, that this university will be recognized—and the operative word here is recognized—by accrediting agencies, the academic community, and the general public as a premier, private, not-for-profit university of quality and distinction that engages all students and produces alumni who serve with integrity in their lives, fields of study, and resulting careers. During the last 18 months, I talked to more than 4,000 people—faculty and staff members, employees, student leaders, and community members—to share what originally started out as my vision. But, during those dialogues, I heard from many people, “If you can add this to the vision statement, it will be my vision statement.” It is, indeed, a shared vision statement. n Horizons The vision has a key component, NSU’s eight core values. n hanbury Students and individuals who associate with this university need to know what we stand for and what values we hold sacrosanct. We will accomplish and fulfill our vision, and see the mission of this university accomplished, without compromising our core values in the name of expediency. Those values are academic excellence, student centered, integrity, innovation, opportunity, scholarship and research, diversity, and community. n Horizons Vision 2020 includes cultivating donors; the need for scholar- ships; and the unprecedented ways to encourage gifts from alumni, faculty and staff members, and friends of the univer- sity. What will you do personally to see that goal met? n hanbury When I became president, I said that I would be more like my preacher asking for individuals’ time, their talent, and, just as important, their gifts or their treasure. I would like to see the percentage of our contributions increase even if it is only one dollar. I would like for them to think about giving one dollar to go toward a deserving student and, in that way, begin to repay the community and this university for the education they received so that others may see their academic dreams come true. n Horizons During your professional career, did you ever imagine you would be president of a university? n hanbury I never thought of it in that fashion. I felt that I always wanted to give back to the community, which is how I got involved in public service in the first place. I really believe that whatever I have achieved, it is from inspirational lessons that my mother [Adah] taught me. She encouraged me to pursue education beyond high school and into college and to get my master’s degree and eventually my Ph.D. She said that “education is an invest- ment that cannot be diminished and is the secret to freedom.” Freedom gives you power to expand in whatever you wish to undertake or do. And the secret to that freedom is courage. So, when you combine courage with the desire to achieve educational pursuits, it gives you the freedom to undertake any path you wish to accomplish. Also, during my investiture, I talked about some truisms that my mother and my father [Emmette] taught me, and one that has been with me in just about everything I’ve done in the last 45 years is, “If a task is once begun, never leave it until it’s done. Be the labor great or small, do it well, George, or not at all.” And that’s the way I’m going to do things until I can’t anymore. Students as leaders n Horizons You enjoy athletics, were a runner, and are an avid swimmer. What do you think of the success of student-athletes at NSU? [For the first time since joining the NCAA in 2002, Nova Southeastern University finished in the top 25, finishing 22nd out of 234 Division II institutions for the National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics Learfield Sports Directors’ Cup for Division II for 2011.]