The University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee has earned the highest rating for a research institution from the Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, the gold standard for assessment.<\/p>\n
The \u201chighest research activity\u201d rating was given to only 115 of the 4,665 universities evaluated this year. In Wisconsin, only UWM and UW-Madison received the rating, often referred to as R1.<\/p>\n
UWM was previously ranked one tier below, as an R2 doctoral university. Chancellor Mark Mone and faculty members celebrated its upgrade.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe national elevation of UWM among doctoral research universities with the highest research activity confirms what we have long known about the importance and impact of UWM’s research mission,\u201d Mone said. \u201cThis is thrilling and gratifying and validation of the remarkable impact of UWM’s faculty, staff and students.\u201d<\/p>\n
First published in 1973, the Carnegie Classification is released every five years. The 2015 ranking, issued last week, was done by Indiana University Bloomington’s Center for Postsecondary Research.<\/p>\n
The need and desire for a major research institution to support and fuel the southeastern Wisconsin was made clear in the 1986 community-based report \u201cUWM & the Future of Metropolitan Milwaukee,\u201d said David Petering, university distinguished professor of chemistry and biochemistry. He described UWM\u2019s elevation to the top tier of research universities as \u201ca remarkable achievement symbolic of decades of collective research and creative work and academic program building by past and current stellar faculty.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mark Harris, interim vice provost for research, said UWM\u2019s climb reflects an intentional effort that dates back to the 1960s, when the administration began building doctoral departments as \u201can implicit commitment to research quality.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, even from the start, they were thinking ahead to what kind of university Milwaukee needed,\u201d Harris said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I think of the last 20 years at the university, we have brought in a lot of good young faculty who have been active researchers,\u201d he continued. \u201cAnd we\u2019ve supplemented that with some investments on the behalf of the university to help them really develop their research.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose investments have paid off.\u201d<\/p>\n
Physicist Xavier Siemens, a member of the Leonard E. Parker Center for Gravitation, Cosmology & Astrophysics, said one of his research projects is an example of a UWM investment that paid off handsomely.<\/p>\n
\u201cI heard about the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav), and while I didn\u2019t know much about it, I thought it was a beautiful experiment, and I wanted to be part of it,\u201d Siemens recalled.<\/p>\n
He applied for a grant from the National Science Foundation, but was turned down because of he lacked expertise in the area. Then he applied for, and received, a Research Growth Initiative grant at which he used to develop his expertise relevant to NANOGrav<\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn\u2019t a great deal of money, but it made it possible for me to hire a grad student, travel to conferences, and attract others to UWM to work on this project,\u201d Siemens said. \u201cNow, eight years later, I\u2019m the principal investigator of the NANOGrav Physics Frontiers Center, a National Science Foundation grant that funds most NANOGrav collaboration members in the U.S. That \u2014 going from knowing little about the project, to being the PI of a $14.5 million grant from NSF \u2014 was enabled by UWM support.\u201d<\/p>\n
Petering stressed that research benefits students at all levels of education, and it gives the university the tools to aid the community. The Carnegie Classification reflects the importance of research and its central role in higher education.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis enhances the recognition of the education that undergraduate and graduate students receive at our institution,\u2019\u201d Petering said. \u201cIt confirms that UWM offers Milwaukee and the state great intellectual resources in support of Wisconsin\u2019s continuing development.\u201d<\/p>\n
Marija Gajdardziska-Josifovska, dean of The Graduate School, said the new ranking \u201cbrings us to the top\u201d and will be a benefit in attracting graduate students and faculty members.<\/p>\n
\u201cAlso, in terms of recruiting faculty, it will be reassuring to people who\u2019ve heard some discouraging news about tenure and some other things that have been happening in the state,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Gajdardziska-Josifovska recently completed a geographical analysis of 2010 Carnegie rankings, which showed that Wisconsin was underrepresented in the Tier 1 category.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just finished a position paper saying we need to be a state with at least two research universities, and that UW-Milwaukee gives us the only opportunity to achieve that,\u201d she said. \u201cSo, this is like a wish come true.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
UWM is one of only 115 research universities in the nation to earn a top rating from the prestigious Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":81,"featured_media":28883,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","uwm_wg_additional_authors":[]},"categories":[174,175],"tags":[],"section":[122,126],"display_categories":[115,116],"related-coverage":[],"uwmnews-feed":[118],"class_list":["post-28878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-research","section-campus-community","section-campus-news","display_categories-top-story-secondary","display_categories-top-story-section","uwmnews-feed-chancellor"],"yoast_head":"\n