Photo: Suresh Garimella, president of UVM. Photo courtesy UVM.
by Joyce Marcel, Vermont Business Magazine
Whenever an institution happily gets a new president, the glowing reports make it sound like the old one was something of a liability. But in the case of the University of Vermont, each president has brought a unique contribution to the university — something that the university needed at that special, specific time.
Each new president’s strengths build upon those of his or her predecessor.
So it appears with the fascinating and accomplished Suresh Garimella, a mechanical engineer and scientific researcher who took over as UVM’s president in 2019 and has rapidly brought great changes to Vermont’s flagship land grant university.
Garimella, 60, is the 27th president of the university. Since taking office, he has gracefully led UVM through the pandemic lockdown; successfully streamlined, in spite of great criticism, the liberal arts curriculum; recruited at a high level; frozen tuition for five years; coaxed more support from the Vermont Legislature; doubled the endowment; oversaw a 47% growth in admissions applications; and greatly strengthened the research arm of the university.
A good example of the university’s expanded research capability is the new UVM-led consortium that includes GlobalFoundries and the state of Vermont. It has recently been designated as one of 31 tech hubs by the U.S. Economic Development Administration, unlocking the opportunity for up to $75 million in federal grant funding to further research in semiconductor technology.
The project, which advances gallium nitride technology for semiconductors in Greater Burlington, was selected for the Tech Hubs Program from among nearly 400 applications.
“When was the last time Burlingtonians and Vermonters thought we were a gallium nitride capital?“ Garimella said, laughing. “But we are. Gallium nitride is a much-advanced technology that GlobalFoundries is good at. And so we’re building a tech hub around it.“
GlobalFoundries is delighted with the partnership.
“It is truly remarkable to have a president of a university eight miles away, like Suresh, who not only possesses an engineering background but also has a deep understanding of the complexities of semiconductor manufacturing,“ said Ken McAvey, vice president and general manager of GlobalFoundries Vermont.
“Suresh is an innovative leader who consistently prioritizes the well-being and success of students, staff and the community,“ McAvey added. “From GF’s perspective, his contributions at UVM have been instrumental in establishing a strong workforce pipeline for the semiconductor industry and other STEM-related fields. In the short time since his appointment, GF has gone from having minimal involvement at UVM to offering a comprehensive range of programs, thanks to the partnership forged with Suresh.“
UVM, which during the 1980s and 1990s had a reputation as something of a party school, has definitely seen some changes under Garimella. New students must be getting more serious, as well, as applications for undergraduate enrollment have surged.
UVM topped 30,000 applicants for the first time ever in 2022.
“Before, we were always a second choice to kids who wanted to go to Harvard, Princeton or Yale,“ said UVM Provost and Senior Vice President Patty Prelock. “But now students are choosing us as a first choice. They’re seeing the innovation that we’re doing. They’re seeing some of the global connections that we’re making. I think the president’s connections internationally help us and give us visibility. We have a group of leaders who are really focused on supporting our students in understanding what it’s like to be a global citizen, even if you are living locally. We’ve done a pretty good job with limited resources.“
Photo: Provost and SVP Patty Prelock. Courtesy photo.
As of Jan. 31, the university’s combined pooled endowment was $816.5 million, an increase of more than 50% from the time Garimella started.
The university also does about $260 million of externally funded research each year, according to Vice President for Research Kirk Dombrowski.
Photo: VP for Reserarch Kirk Dombrowski. Courtesy photo.
“We have some great work going on right now in semiconductors and the electrical power grid,“ Dombrowski said. “We have a very active cancer center. We do a lot of work in addiction research. So we have very strong science and medicine research, kind of across the board.“
So who is Suresh Garimella, the person behind all the changes? His colleagues describe him as very bright — more than one called him “brilliant“ — a charming conversationalist and a huge movie buff. He counts “Doctor Zhivago“ and “Lawrence of Arabia“ among his favorite films, which is only appropriate given his resemblance to the star of those pictures, Omar Sharif.
“Suresh may be brilliant,“ observed UVM board chair Ron Lumbra. “He may be aggressive. He may be ambitious. He may be resilient. He may be all those things. He’s also a really good person.
Photo: Board of Trustees chair Ron Lumbra. Courtesy photo.
“I’ve gotten to know his family. I’ve gotten to know his wife, Lakshmi, and his kids, who are doing exceptionally well in their own lives and careers. He’s a really good, family-oriented person with great, terrific values. He’s the kind of person you want to be with, whether he’s leading a university or just being part of your social circle. It’s the total package, both personally and professionally.“
Lumbra, a partner in the CEO and board practice at New York City-based Heidrick & Struggles, said his trustee colleagues are very pleased with what Garimella has accomplished as president.
“He has brought an energy and enthusiasm and an ambition to UVM that has really made a difference for us,“ Lumbra said. “He has a real drive for success and accomplishment that is just inherent in who he is. And he’s fearless in going after those goals that he has set for the university. It’s made a big difference in terms of what we’ve accomplished and how we’re viewed. He’s really done a wonderful job.“
Lumbra said he is especially impressed by the way Garimella has focused on research.
“Within academia, research is very important in terms of reputation and the standing of the university,“ Lumbra said. “It’s very important in terms of access to funding. The funding that comes with the increased research is substantial. He came in with a plan to really go after that and make us much more brightly illuminated on the map in terms of research. It’s an example of an initiative that he just took on with gusto. Even though it’s challenging, even though it’s competitive, there are lots of institutions who would love to have the research success that we’ve been able to achieve.“
Retired U.S. Sen. Patrick Leahy, for whom UVM’s new Leahy Center for Rural Partnerships is named, also speaks highly of Garimella.
“I really admire him because he’s doubled research money at the university,“ Leahy said. “He has helped attract people of a very high level there. He’s been able to raise standards at the same time and he’s kept tuition flat for Vermonters for years. There is no other university I know of that has been able to do that.“
Leahy said he was impressed with the quality of applications for funding from his namesake center, whose mission is to provide engagement opportunities and partnerships with UVM for the benefit of the state’s rural communities.
“Initially, we could have funded three times as many (requests) due to the quality of the applications,“ he said. “So we had to go down to the best of the best.“
Recently funded projects include:
• The Whey Forward: Recapturing Nutrients from Dairy Production Waste. Diverting waste from Vermont waterways and soils, recapturing it and transforming it into nutritious food products through a process called valorization.
• Vermont Wastewater Infrastructure Mapping. Systematic mapping of available wastewater infrastructure data on a town-by-town basis for the state of Vermont.
• Migrant Health Initiative. Strengthen the Community Health Worker program to address health inequities among the growing number of nonagricultural Spanish-speaking migrant and immigrant households moving into Vermont’s rural communities.
Prelock, who works closely with Garimella, said the word she uses most often to describe him is “passionate.“
“I think you have to have someone who has a vision and is passionate about that vision,“ Prelock said. “Suresh is clearly passionate about amplifying the impact of the university, which is kind of his strategic imperative. You also need someone who is a good steward of dollars. He recognizes that we have to capitalize on the resources that we have, build on those and invest where we can.“
Garimella is not afraid to make difficult decisions — “and that’s not easy to do,“ Prelock said.
“I think you also need a person who has a little bit of a sense of humor and doesn’t take himself so seriously. Because there are going to be times where the faculty, the students, the staff, the community are going to say, ’What the heck was the university thinking?’ But you have to stay focused and surround yourself with good people.“
In Vermont, where the idea of the land grant college was born, Garimella is also passionate about UVM’s mission to educate Vermonters, Prelock said.
“Knowing that we are a very expensive institution, how can we make it as affordable as possible for students who want to go here and have a first-rate education?“ Prelock said. “That’s why Suresh took the giant leap of freezing tuition for five years, which was not easy. It meant lots of sacrifices. But we made it work. And when he had to institute a slight increase this year, it was hard for him, because he’s so passionate about wanting to make sure that a college education is accessible to students.“
In my conversations with Garimella, he has proven to be funny, energetic, agreeable, sincere and exceptionally loquacious. Prelock has a more nuanced take on her boss.
“I tease him because he has high expectations,“ she said. “And he is impatient. He wants things done yesterday. But I think that’s what makes him so effective. He pushes us to our full potential. He knows we can move the dial. And he’s right there to support you and give you advice, but he’s not going to let you fall prey to things like ’I’m not sure if I can do this’ or ’This is going to be too hard.’ He says, ’No, no, no! We can make this work. This is what we can do. Let’s try these three things.’“
Prelock said Garimella is one of the smartest people she knows.
“He’s also fun to talk to,“ she said. “He knows how to ask questions. He’s got a dry sense of humor; sometimes you don’t know if he’s serious or not. He’ll burst out laughing because he’s pulling your chain. He’s a difference-maker. He wants to make changes that are going to be impactful.
“He’s also hard-working; I tease him about needing to take a vacation. And he says, ’I have so much work to do.’ I said, ’Suresh, I don’t want you to burn yourself out. And in the process, because you’re working so hard, everyone else is trying to keep up with you. That’s not easy to do.’“
In April 2020, when Garimella recruited Dombrowski from the University of Nebraska to oversee and grow UVM’s research arm, he was basically seeking to fill the job that he himself had been doing at Purdue University, before he came to Vermont.
“I knew that he had worked very hard to grow research at Purdue via corporate partnerships and large-scale institutional projects,“ Dombrowski said. “And I was guessing that he would want to do the same thing here. I knew he was engaged at the national level at the National Science Board and that he was a sort of a national-level figure in science. That was pretty exciting. He was very well known throughout the Midwest as someone who had a very strong vision about research and what kinds of opportunities that would create. He understands my job and he allows me to make my own decisions and make my own mistakes. I appreciate the fact that he’s given me a lot of room to operate.“
Dombrowski is responsible for everything from federal grant accounting to the caring of research animals.
“My team handles all of the research administration, all of the accounting for federal grants and research protections, which means that we oversee making sure of safety and bio-safety and the use of research animals and all of those things,“ Dombrowski said. “We run a number of the large core facilities. We take care of all 9,000 research animals. We maintain all the research equipment. We do all of the licensing and startup and venture funding for companies that spin out of UVM. We oversee the medical research. And then we teach people how to go out and get grants. I oversee all of our federal interactions as far as funding goes, and I oversee our community engagement and corporate partnerships.“
Dombrowski said the one thing people might not know about Garimella is how driven he is to reach the “missing millions“ — the people who fall off the radar and never go to college.
“It doesn’t come through all the time, because he’s a budget balancer and a very tech-savvy person,“ Dombrowski said. “But he feels deeply, personally and passionately about getting students who wouldn’t normally have access to a university education into a university setting and getting them an education that will allow them to succeed. I would say that’s the one thing that I think people underestimate about him. It’s a phrase they use at the National Science Foundation, the ’missing millions,’ those millions of potential scientists and researchers and tech leaders that we miss because they are from families that don’t know about colleges, or don’t have the money, or something else. His passion lies with those kids, those missing kids.“
Had he had different parents, it is possible Garimella and his siblings might be among the missing millions themselves. The youngest of three children, Garimella was born and raised in India and grew up in a family that greatly valued higher education as a path to upward mobility. After considering careers in medicine and engineering, he chose the latter and got his first degree, a Bachelor of Technology in mechanical engineering, in Madras. He described the experience as “much more intense than MIT.“
He then came to the U.S. for his master’s and doctorate and continued on as a professor and researcher at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee and, later, Purdue University, while working on the national and international stage under a number of U.S. presidents.
Garimella’s brother is a professor at Georgia Tech; his sister recently retired from the household cleaning supplies manufacturer S.C. Johnson as a director. Their parents spend part of their time in India and part in the U.S.
Photo: President Garimella with students at Late Night Breakfast in the Davis Center. Photo courtesy UVM.
Early Life
Garimella emphasizes that neither of his parents had college degrees. His father was an engineer, and his mother was a housewife.
“My mother took care of us and gave us everything we have become,“ Garimella said. “She was in charge of our education and everything else. At the time I was growing up in India, education was the ticket. We don’t come from a family with means. A way to succeed was to study hard. I think today there are more options as the country’s become more affluent. People can, in fact, thrive in other areas of work. But then, the emphasis was on education.“
The Garimella family was looking for professional careers that would secure a lifelong livelihood.
“We didn’t have businesses to run or money to invest in various things,“ Garimella said. “My parents were very focused on our education and prioritized that above all else. I think I changed schools seven times during my K-12 education because my parents were focused on finding the best schools. I had really great teachers. I feel like a lot of what I am today was because of my teachers.“
It seems that Garimella was interested in almost everything.
“Certainly physics, but also chemistry, biology, math, and also English and history and geography and the languages, like Sanskrit and Hindi and English,“ he said. “The teachers made all the subjects so interesting that I could see a future in any of those fields. The teachers you have growing up can have such a great impact on your life.“
In January of this year, Garimella was in India, speaking to about 10,000 aspiring student leaders.
“They asked me to talk about what the message would be for the next generation,“ Garimella said. “They thought I’d talk about AI (artificial intelligence), quantum computing and things like that. I talked about my journey and the importance of hard work and discipline. I guess that’s what my parents gave us.“
Getting accepted to an engineering program or medical school is extremely competitive in India, but Garimella earned entry to both.
“I could have been a doctor; I got into the top medical schools,“ he said. “I ended up choosing to be an engineer on the spur of the moment. But I’m still very interested in medicine. I have great respect for doctors, and I read a lot about medical advances. I’m the family doctor. If my parents need something, I’m their doctor.“
After getting his bachelor’s degree in 1985, Garimella came to the United States.
“The best place to do advanced degrees is in the U.S.,“ he said. “So I applied to a few schools and got in with a scholarship. I wanted to pursue the best education in the world.“
He earned a master’s in mechanical engineering from Ohio State University in 1986 and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1989.
Garimella speaks Hindi and Telugu, the language of the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, and learned Sanskrit and some French from his time in Algeria, where his father was posted for a while.
“We were out there for several summers, so I either had to learn Arabic or French,“ he said. “I picked up French on the fly.“
Garimella has traveled to every continent and many countries.
“It is very eye-opening,“ he said. “If I was to bequeath advice to my students, I would say read as much as you can and travel as much as you can. Nothing opens your mind as those two things do.“
Photo: The Garimella family with UVM Bernoulli. Photo courtesy UVM.
Heat Transfer
After getting his PhD, Garimella served as an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, from 1990 to 1999, and then moved to Purdue as a faculty member from 1999 to 2019. Both positions came with teaching and research responsibilities.
Garimella’s research interests are in the fields of thermal and energy transport at micro- and nano-scales, energy efficiency in electronics, and renewable and sustainable energy systems. He has an engaging way of explaining to the average person what that means.
“At the most basic level, it’s about transferring heat or cooling things,“ he said. “It’s about energy, and it’s about efficiency. So how do you generate energy or restore energy? How do you get rid of heat? Most electronics, whether it be computers, phones, space shuttles or aircraft, fail because they overheat. The electronics in them overheat. So my research — a big portion of it — was directed at keeping things cool. Sort of getting rid of that heat in a way that didn’t destroy the electronics.“
Once the heat is removed, it can have other uses.
“The electricity that goes into electronic components has to go somewhere,“ Garimella said. “We came up with many solutions for the best way to invest in nanotechnology and microscale, new materials and new approaches to keeping such things cool. Whether it’s on the space shuttle, as I said, or a data center or in phones or laptops.“
At Purdue, Garimella’s research was funded by a consortium of about 45 companies.
“That included IBM, Apple, Nokia, car companies like Toyota, because cars are about electronics, and then aircraft companies like Boeing,“ he said. “We worked with all of them. They all have similar needs in some ways. So we came up with ways of keeping things operational and efficient. I also worked in solar energy, and with other ways of reusing waste heat.“
He is the rare kind of person who can find beauty in fluid mechanics.
“I was in mechanical engineering, so I could have done sort of control systems or gears or manufacturing,“ he said. “You don’t limit yourself to any one topic, right? In doing heat transfer, you do a lot of machine learning, you do artificial intelligence, some days you do material science. You have to know something about manufacturing, so they’re all interrelated. But the reason I got interested in heat transfer, as in my bachelor’s degree, was that it seemed more of an art than a science. As opposed to just equations — and I do equations as well — there was a lot of beauty to fluid mechanics and heat transfer and how either heat or mass or fluids flow and transport happens.“
According to Purdue University, Garimella’s research group has published more than 625 refereed journal and conference publications and edited or contributed to a number of books. Sixteen U.S. patents have been issued for their inventions. Twenty-nine former members of this group are in faculty positions at leading universities around the world.
At Purdue, Garimella developed the certificate program in advanced heat transfer, with the backing of United Technologies Corp. He developed tailored courses and tutorials that have been delivered to industrial and academic audiences in the U.S. and abroad.
Also at Purdue, he founded and directed the Cooling Technologies Research Center, designed to create connections between academic researchers and industry partners to make possible the practical applications of scholarly work. Many of the key electronics and computer companies worldwide are members of this center, which has attracted large state and federal grants. Because he thinks of mentoring as a key aspect of a professor’s role, Garimella is particularly proud that the CTRC organizes industrial internships and avenues for career placement for undergraduate and graduate students.
International Man
Garimella has had an interest in policy and world affairs for as long as he can remember.
“I could have imagined a stint with the World Health Organization or UNESCO,“ he said. “I was intrigued by the United Nations. When I was a kid, I thought the greatest job in the world was U.N. secretary general, because you could sort of rule the world. Of course, that’s not true. But the interest in policy, and how science and truth are used in policy, was of great interest to me.“
He dreamed of taking a sabbatical at Harvard Kennedy School, for example, but never found the time.
“But then this fellowship at the State Department came along where I could serve as a science adviser to Secretary (Hillary) Clinton at that time,“ Garimella said.
Photo: Garimella chats with a student at a reception for international students. Photo courtesy UVM.
In 2010, Garimella was appointed a Jefferson Science Fellow to serve as a science adviser in the economic bureau of the International Energy Office. There he helped engage the American academic science community in the formulation and implementation of U.S. foreign policy.
“The State Department will bring in senior people with expertise in different areas,“ Garimella explained. “I was interested in how policy is made. And so I worked in the energy office. I introduced a brown-bag lunch. It seems like a simple idea, but it brought the green folks together with the oil folks. I would bring in a person from the CIA to talk about sustainability or the vulnerability of energy grids. I would moderate the conversation. And to this day, they talk about how they really miss that.“
When President Barack Obama announced in Cairo that he wanted to engage with Muslim-majority countries, Garimella was ready to help.
“Nobody knew what to do with that,“ he said. “So they said, ’Hey, you’re not a senator. Why don’t you tell us what to do?’ So I took that on. I happened to know some more about nuclear engineering than anybody around there, so I became the expert. We had higher-ed dialogue between India and the U.S. I brought together 25 presidents of top universities from both the U.S. and India, and we had a pretty good discussion about higher ed.“
Garimella was often consulted on policy decisions, which gave him greater insight into how these decisions are made.
“It was a heady time,“ he said. “For example, during the Libyan gas crisis, my office was asked by the White House to advise them on whether the strategic petroleum reserves should be released. We did an analysis and recommended that they should not be. The next day, the White House released the petroleum reserves. I got to understand the technical aspects, the economic aspects and then the political aspects of the issue. And it’s OK. You make your recommendations, and the country’s president makes the decisions. That’s why he gets paid the big bucks. You don’t have to win every time.“
Garimella was the State Department’s delegate to the International Energy Agency and a member of the U.S.-Russia Bilateral Presidential Commission’s Science and Technology Working Group.
He served for six years as senior fellow in the State Department’s Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas, an Obama Era initiative to support countries in the Americas in their transition to clean, resilient and inclusive energy systems.
In 2017 Garimella was elected as a National Academy of Inventors fellow, and in 2018 he was appointed a member of the National Science Board. His professional activities also include serving as an editorial advisory board member and/or editor of several professional journals as well as the organizer of conferences on thermal management.
Garimella has won 23 awards ranging from the Society of Automotive Engineers’ Outstanding Faculty Advisor, in 1994, to the 75th Anniversary Medal, Heat Transfer Division, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, in 2013.
He left Purdue as a Distinguished Professor Emeritus.
Heat-To-People Transfer
Garimella’s accomplishments as an engineer are impressive, but it takes a special kind of person to jump from the research lab into management.
“People often complain about administrators,“ Garimella said. “Well, I think you should then step in and do it yourself.“
Garimella said that despite all his achievements, he was very happy as a faculty member. “I’ve graduated over 150 graduate students and postdocs and such, and it gives me great joy,“ he said. “I’ve taught many, many courses. I could have done that all my life.“
Garimella still works with doctoral. students at UVM.
“Being a faculty member grounds you,“ he said. “I understand my colleagues here — what they’re going through, what the staff is going through, what students are going through.“
Garimella insists he has never actively sought any of his other responsibilities; the opportunities seemed to find him.
“I was happy to be a researcher and an educator,“ he said. “I didn’t apply for most things I have done, and I’ve not regretted any of them. I’ve had experience in government, I’ve had experience in university administration and research. I also serve on a private sector board. I serve on the board of Sandia National Labs. I feel blessed about the broad range of opportunities that I’ve had, because each informs the other and enriches the other.“
Coming to Vermont
It was UVM’s medical school that first attracted Garimella to Vermont.
“I was an executive vice president at Purdue,“ Garimella said. “I think I had a successful run. We broke records in research and partnerships. Now I was interested in the next challenge. So looking at other universities, this one (UVM) came along. Purdue did not have a medical school. I was very interested in the fact that UVM had a medical school right on campus. It’s very, very rare. Actually, most medical campuses are not on the main campus, almost nowhere else in the country. And so, with the fact that engineering and business and medicine are all next to each other, I thought there was a lot of potential. I wanted to learn about how to integrate that into a university.“
He could see that UVM was in good shape — that the Legislature supported the school, that its board of trustees was functional and that the school was not in debt.
“It also had a strong liberal arts core, larger than it does in engineering or the professional schools,“ Garimella said. “That was an interesting draw for me, because I wanted to learn about it. What makes that kind of thing take? How does it get supported? It was different from Purdue. And I’m glad I came, because it has been a great experience.“
COVID Causes Changes
Garimella may have been prepared to make changes at UVM, but he could not have foreseen the coronavirus pandemic. He took office on July 1, 2019, and by March 20, 2020, the entire state was in lockdown.
“That was a very difficult time for everyone in society, but a very difficult time for an enterprise like UVM, which touches so many constituents throughout the campus,“ said trustee chair Lumbra. “And candidly, Suresh didn’t have a lot of history building relationships, because he hadn’t been around that long.“
Garimella worked tirelessly during the pandemic to stay on top of things, Lumbra said.
“He kept our campus functioning, he kept people safe, he made sure the right protocols were in place, he had a great relationship with state authorities,“ Lumbra said. “And it’s the kind of thing, quite candidly, that could have worn down most people. But his resilience and his sharp brain and ability to adjust to changing incoming information was extraordinary during the pandemic. I will tell you, the board came away from that experience thinking even more highly of him as our president.“
Sacrifices had to be made during that time, Prelock said.
“We had no choice because, like most universities, we experienced a decrease in enrollments,“ Prelock said. “But we did well in terms of how we were going to handle keeping students safe and healthy. We weren’t going to be able to do the pay increases that we would typically want to do. We were going to have to stay the course of making sure that we know why we’re here.“
UVM tightened up. It centralized information technology services and put a new focus on research administration. It searched for shared services with other colleges and universities. It looked at adjusting its health care costs. And it revamped its liberal arts curriculum, eliminating some majors and minors.
“We’ve renegotiated how we are going to think of ourselves as a university,“ Prelock said.
Garimella remembers well the angst that COVID brought.
“Some people were predicting about a 13% drop in enrollment,“ he said. “Things were looking a little scary. There was no vaccine. We weren’t sure where we were going. So it was important for us all to think about whether we were being as strategic and as efficient and as effective as we could be.“
Some changes to the liberal arts curriculum proved controversial.
“The deans of the colleges looked at their offerings,“ Garimella said. “And every college — not just Arts and Sciences but also the College of Agriculture, the College of Engineering, the nursing school — looked at their programs and chose to pursue closing or sunsetting those minors and majors that were not graduating any students.“
Some of these programs had graduated a single student in three years or had an enrollment of just a handful of students over a long period of time.
“It seemed very reasonable to me, if there’s a program that has one or two students over a three-year period, it’s not appropriate,“ Garimella said. “It shows there’s no student interest in that program. And add to that, we’re wasting resources and running that program at the same time that we have a faculty member teaching 180 students in a class. It’s a fairness and equity thing.“
In the College of Arts and Sciences alone, the dean proposed eliminating or sunsetting 28 programs.
“There was a lot of concern that we were cutting the arts and humanities,“ Garimella said. “As it turns out, the changes the dean proposed were approved unanimously by the departments, the college committee, the Faculty Senate, the trustees and all that.
“It’s past history. Now, everyone’s very happy. We’re back up to where we were 15 years ago. We have a new School of the Arts that has breathed so much life and so much energy into the campus. And instead of five tiny departments of art, dance, theater, music, etc., it’s one School of the Arts, which has a critical mass. The dean who runs this program is just a fantastic force of nature. There’s donor interest. And this year, we saw a 16% increase in enrollment.“
The School of Languages experienced similar success.
“There were about eight or nine departments that came together into one School of Languages and Cultures,“ Garimella said. “And they’re seeing the joy of that. It was not a bad thing. I stand very strongly by what we did.“
The point is to take action before you are forced to take action, he said.
“We did it before it became necessary,“ Garimella said. “All these universities around the country were going through these cuts. But for UVM, being a very heavily tuition-dependent university, we’re actually doing quite well. I think we’ll keep making whatever changes are needed to keep us ahead.“
The syllabus changes illustrate Garimella’s courage, Lumbra said.
“Not everyone is going to be on board quickly with where things are heading,“ he said. “The downside is whenever you make change in a sector that’s resistant to change, there will be people who will object to that change, and not feel as good about the change, for example, as the board does.
“It’s especially difficult in higher ed. There will be people who aren’t on board with the change. That’s the price you sometimes have to pay when you’re trying to make a difference and improve in an ambitious way.“
Photo: Posing with students at Convocation. Photo courtesy UVM.
The Costs of College
UVM is known as an expensive school among the country’s public institutions. Traditionally, land grant colleges are supported by their state’s legislature. That is not quite the whole story in Vermont.
“While the Legislature does support us, our funding from them is limited,“ Prelock explained. “Unlike several public universities across the nation, where a significant portion of their operating costs and some of their capital expenses are supported by the Legislature, we don’t have the dollars to do that.“
For many years, UVM’s support from the state exceeded $40 million, plus an extra $2 million for scholarships, Prelock said.
“About $22 million of that went back to scholarships for Vermont students, and then half went to the College of Agriculture and Life Science and the extension program,“ she said, “Then half went into the medical school. That’s nothing for an institution that has a budget of $700 million or $800 million. I know New York just gave Stony Brook like $50 million for their IT program to help increase internet access, etc. Well, we don’t even get that for our entire allocation.“
A year ago Garimella was able to coax a $10 million increase from the Legislature.
“That’s why we were able to keep the tuition low,“ Prelock said. “And remember, we froze tuition for five years for everyone. And for a sixth year, for Vermonters. We now say that any Vermont family making less than $75,000 a year can send their kids for free to UVM. And we did all that without actually letting go of staff or faculty or cutting that way.“
UVM has changed in other ways as well.
“We built a new medical research facility,“ Garimella said. “We invested heavily in an integrative arts hall and a recital hall. It’s wonderful. I go to a lot of concerts there. We’ve invested $83 million in athletics facilities in terms of wellness and health and such. We’re being careful and strategic and thoughtful about where we invest our money while being careful about expenditures. At the same time, we’re growing research and drawing philanthropic giving.“
A president’s job requires striking a balance between the many streams of income and expenditures at the university, Garimella said.
“It’s hard to understand for most people, but I’m proud of how UVM has navigated the last five years,“ he said.
Where Are the Men?
Across the nation, statistics are showing that more women than men are attending colleges and universities. This holds true at UVM.
“It’s great for the women,“ Garimella said. “But the young men, what are they doing? Their prospects are not improving. That’s a national problem. When I came here, I saw that UVM has an exacerbated problem in that space. Part of it has to do with our offerings. If you’re a strong engineering school, you get more men. That’s the way it goes. And yet three years ago our incoming class was 69% women and 31% men. That was beginning to get very worrisome.“
The university has begun to more actively recruit male students.
“We made it easier for them to consider going to UVM,“ Garimella said. “What’s more interesting and important is that not only are fewer men going to college, but men of color, Latino men, Black men are dropping out or not going to college at larger rates.“
UVM has partnered with Rick Dalton, founder and CEO of CFES Brilliant Pathways, a nonprofit organization based in New York, to start a Young Men of Talent program.
“We just started a pilot to take 100 students — young men of talent, Black and Latino men — from high school through UVM, and then finding them jobs,“ Garimella said. “We basically mentor them through this whole pathway and see if we can make a difference. We have a cohort of 20 students this year. Some are from Vermont and some are not. We mentor them; we have many people trying to help them with their success. I think trying to achieve some balance in that space is quite important.“
At the same time, the university has sought to diversify its faculty. Since 2018, the number of faculty of color has increased by 50%, Garimella said.
“It was hard to imagine that happening,“ he said. “Every year for the last three years we’ve had more students of color and more first-generation students. These are all very big trends for us, very big things we’ve tried to do. And we’ve been successful.“
The Future
Though UVM is humming along right now, change is always in the air. First and foremost, Garimella wants to cap annual freshman enrollments at 3,000.
“That’s our goal, plus or minus,“ he said. “Sometimes you exceed by 20 or 30. This year we were down by 100. But plus or minus, 3,000 is our incoming class goal. That would make for about 12,000 (undergraduate) students and 3,000 graduate students. I think 15,000 students is what UVM was built for. Our classrooms, our faculty size — that’s a good size.“
Construction of more student housing is also on the agenda, the president said.
“We’ve been really very thoughtful in terms of housing,“ he said. “We’ve planned for construction of about 1,200 new beds. About half of those are coming online for fall semester. We’ve also announced plans to add about 545 beds for juniors and seniors in the parking lot next to the DoubleTree by Hilton, which is much closer to campus. We just recently had permission from the board to lease the Holiday Inn that’s been redone. We’re bringing that online, and we’ll have students there. If more rooms are needed, we’ll do more.
He added, “I don’t think our student body is increasing, so we also need to think about the quality of some of the older buildings and whether they need to be pulled down. We will continue to partner with the private sector to build housing. We are working with the city of Burlington to try and get some zoning regulations relaxed so we can build on more of our campus area.“
In the meantime, the university has spent millions of dollars to upgrade and expand the Multipurpose Center, though renovations to the basketball facilities remain on hold until a donor can be found, Garimella said.
“Because of the COVID, we had to stop construction by the governor’s orders,“ he explained. “As we came out of it, the board decided it was going to be done in phases, anyway. They said, ’Let’s prioritize the health and wellness phase.’ So they approved about $27 million more at that time. We had Zumba classes, the climbing wall and spin cycle stuff. That is being used very heavily by our students across campus.
“We quadrupled our health and wellness space. And then we went back and the board approved some more money to double the individual fitness thing for our athletes’ space. So we’re constructing that. We’re finishing up some projects in the swimming area and the hockey area. The one thing that we don’t have enough money for at this point is the basketball arena.“
It will cost between $70 million and $75 million to upgrade the basketball facilities, Garimella said.
“If somebody comes along and gives us that money, or at least a good amount of it, we’re very happy to build it,“ he said. “We can borrow some, but we don’t have enough borrowing authority to borrow it all. The project remains open. And when we can collect the funding, we will continue the project.“
Fundraising is a vital part of a president’s job, Garimella said.
“There are many important jobs as a university leader, and fundraising is a very important part,“ he said. “There are only three ways that the university’s resource base can be increased. One is by increasing tuition, Another is by getting more of a state appropriation. The third is by fundraising.“
Garimella has been creative in his efforts to find additional resources.
“We’re trying to see if we can use beautiful Burlington by bringing in more conferences and educational opportunities in the summer," he said. “We’re improving our distance education and professional continuing education office. We’ll keep looking at creative ways of enhancing our resources.“
Even with many successes under his belt, Garimella feels he has just started boosting the research arm of the university.
“Right now, research has doubled,“ he said. “We’ve crossed a quarter of a billion dollars in research. All that money is being spent here in Vermont. Many of the research projects are of interest to Vermonters and to Vermont problems. And yet, that does not add to our base funding. It does not pay salaries or pay for all the things we need to pay for.“
Research always requires the university to put out more money than it brings in, Garimella said.
“The only real ways of getting more money is by increasing tuition — and we’re already very expensive — or by fundraising,“ he said. “Our donors have been very generous. I spend a good amount of time working with our friends and the alumni in foundations and companies. One thing we’ve done is to build corporate partnerships. That’s been a great growth area for us.“
UVM now works closely with National Life Group, Beta, MassMutual and other Vermont-based companies. But the gallium nitride consortium with GlobalFoundries is its prime leader. It is all about building the future sustainability — financial and otherwise — of the university.
Garimella is happy at UVM and loves living in Vermont. He said he is not looking for his next challenge.
“People are happy with me, and I’m happy with them,“ Garimella said. “I’m enjoying my time here. It’s a great state to live in. I love running by the lake and going up Mount Philo. I have a lot of energy, and a lot of things to do. I think things are going well.
“I want to have UVM be a great partner to the state,“ he added. “How can we improve economic development, workforce? How can we touch every part of the state? How can we try to improve the way the institution is for all its new partnerships? UVM has good intellectual resources. We can add to the social capital and the intellectual capital of the state. We’re working on that. And there’s a lot more to do.“
Joyce Marcel is a journalist in southern Vermont.