Dec. 2, 2003

GW’s Premier Provost: John F. Williams

(This is Part I of an interview with University Provost John F. Williams. Part II will be published in January.)

ByGeorge!: You’ve been GW’s provost for almost a year now. Can you discuss your overall experiences in that capacity and how the role has evolved.

John Williams: My primary responsibility is to help coordinate media and public relations for the whole University, as well as government, corporate and international affairs. One of the things the president would like to see is all of the different units and colleges of the University actually speaking the same language when talking to the external world. I’ve been working with Michael Freedman (vice president for communications) and Richard Sawaya (vice president for government, international and corporate affairs). We have an external relations working group that’s looking at both internally and externally how GW is perceived by the community, city and beyond. We tend to, in many ways, be much better known outside of the Beltway than we are inside. We are attracting tremendous students as a result of our reputation. Now we need to figure out a way to have a better and closer relationship with our neighbors, not only in Foggy Bottom and the West End, but in the rest of the city.

ByG!: How can GW achieve that goal?

JW: We’ve started doing things such as the FRIENDS block party. Some things we have been doing for years, such as giving away 2,000 free flu shots. We do stroke screening clinics. We have the GW Mammovan that we take not only to paying patients and corporations, but to underserved areas where people can’t afford to pay for mammograms. Other things like publications — how do we make our publications such that the community wants to read them as well as our internal audience. How do we start publicizing some of the things our neighbors and citizens are doing so we can get a wider audience.

The president also wanted to get his arms around some of our international programs. We have great study abroad programs for medical, public health and nurse practitioner students. Then, when you look at the rest of the University, between the Elliott School of International Affairs, the Graduate School of Education and Human Development and the Columbian College of Arts and Sciences, we have lots of students and professors in different parts of the world. How does the president know where they are when he travels? So we’re making an inventory of where our people are.

Another real change for me has been the amount of time I spend on Capitol Hill speaking with various congressmen and senators about projects that GW is interested in, particularly at the Virginia Campus as we begin to try and grow that campus. We’ve gone from one building to three. We’ve been approved to build a fourth. If I had my way, we’d build a fifth — a satellite school of public health.

ByG!: What are some success stories on the Hill?

JW: We have the $5 million appropriation for the READI center (Response to Emergencies and Disasters Institute). We are currently working with two pieces of legislation for transportation safety. If that works out, it will be a home run. We also are working on financing for our GW Cancer Institute.

ByG!: Are there other long-term goals for you?

JW: The long-term goal has been stated by the president and that’s clearly to get us into the Research I institutions. We’ve seen on the Medical Center side a 40 percent increase in our external funding while the University has seen a significant increase in its funding. That’s important because you attract the best faculty, hence the best students. It’s a wonderful trickle-down effect.

ByG!: As provost, what’s one thing you’ve learned about GW that you didn’t know before?

JW: It would be how multifaceted this University is. For example, I was unaware of all the computer and IT security projects we’re doing. Also, I was surprised by the real diversity of the faculty and the types of research. I always knew we were a rich University in terms of our intellectual capital, but actually meeting the folks on a regular basis has been a real eye-opener for me.

ByG!: ByGeorge! has published a number of stories recently that quote deans and professors mentioning partnerships with the Medical Center. Can you talk about the significance of reaching across disciplines and breaking out of a silo-type thinking?

JW: I think the only way you attain greatness in the 21st century is to have a collaborative and multidisciplinary approach. I heard a talk given by Elias A. Zerhouni, director of the National Institutes of Health, and he said science is way too complex to have it compartmentalized. The only way we’re going to come up with the new breakthroughs in the 21st century is through collaborative research. Having heard that from him and being a believer in that, one of the things I talked to Dean (William) Frawley in the Columbian College about was our recent establishment of a degree in proteomics, genomics and bioinformatics. He has people in the chemistry and biology area that are interested in proteomics. It just makes absolute sense that all of our scientists should collaborate and maybe, indeed, share laboratory space. Well, in fact, that is going to happen. His new hires will have laboratory space in the school of medicine.

Another model is with the engineering school and the biomedical engineering degree. Dean Timothy Tong came along and said we have this resource called the Medical Center. We said we have this resource called the School of Engineering and Applied Science. We got together and we now have a joint degree.

We have programs with the Law School and the Elliott School, too. We want our homeland security initiatives to be a University-wide effort. It’s not a Medical Center effort. We’re inviting faculty from across the University. We’re going to set up internships for students. So I think the silos are clearly, if not shoulder high, then they’re down to the knees.

Send feedback to: bygeorge@gwu.edu