As enrollments rise, we must ensure that an appropriate balance between teaching and research is maintained. On the one hand, it is essential to improve on the instructional contact and facilities encountered by our undergraduate students. Given the laboratory-intensive nature of many programs, we must focus not only on the classroom experience but also on the laboratory aspects of their studies. Renewal of classroom and laboratory facilities and equipment also must be central to this effort, and a priority in any SuperBuild funds received by Western. On the other hand, the considerable faculty energies required to maintain and expand an extensive research infrastructure, and to compete favourably for the externally derived funds, that underpin any research-intensive enterprise, must be protected, sustained and further encouraged.
Science is an essential and significant platform for future economic growth.
Science is also expensive, and requires a disproportionate share of resources compared to many other university-based disciplines to fuel its growth. We must be prepared to make increased investment if success in science is to be a University priority. Science produces ideas that spawn new technologies and other applications of knowledge. This requires co-operative planning and budgeting among Faculties and their Deans, beginning at the earliest stages of project development. Our task is to identify the best people and the projects that make the greatest scientific sense and to do so with great dispatch and a real sense of excitement.