New PU president Daniels locks down 1st day in office

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WLFI) - Tuesday was the first official day for Purdue University's 12th president, Mitch Daniels.

He spoke to News 18 on a wide range of topics, from changes he wants to make, to one possible change he may want to stop.

The new office in Hovde Hall for Daniels doesn't quite seem like home yet.

"It's a sea of strangers to me," he said.

But he adds the welcome has been quite warm since the announcement in June anointing him as Purdue's next president.
    
In the last seven months, he said he's done lots of reading to prepare. The three biggest things he's learned: higher education has plenty of money but doesn't always spend it well, many students don't have to learn much to earn a degree, and emerging technology is starting to undercut the traditional residential college model.

"What excites me, though, is that I do believe Purdue is an outlier to these trends or can be," Daniels said. "If there's going to be a difficult period in higher education, Purdue has a chance to separate from the pack."

Daniels issued no executive orders or announced no major cuts in his first day in office. He said he will be continuing to solicit input from faculty and students.    

"It's too soon to say," he said. "I think that just from common sense and some previous experience, I think I know some areas to look in, but I don't know what we'll find."

He added specifically that he will target redundancies and using outside services when it's cheaper to do it in-house and vice versa.

But one position he's changed his tune on is the announced switch to trimesters. He said he initially thought the entire University was behind it. But he's since learned that there's not quite University consensus for it and more study may be needed. One of the biggest things he wants to determine is if there's enough student demand for the switch.

"Clearly we have to use the summer months better than today," Daniels said. "Whether that takes us to what we call the full trimester system is yet to be determined for certain."

Daniels has a salary based on incentives like overall excellence and student learning and success. He said more specific benchmark targets have not yet been set.

The interview wasn't all serious. When asked about his favorite movies, he said "Casablanca" is No. 1, followed closely by "Animal House."