ECU holds back to school convocation

Published Aug 21, 1995 by
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Plans for a $100 million fund-raising campaign, improvements in campus facilities and a student enrollment capped at 20,000 were among the achievement goals cited for East Carolina University at the annual fall semester convocation Monday.

Dr. Richard R. Eakin, ECU chancellor, outlined his goals for the university when he addressed 1,200 ECU faculty this morning. The ceremony also included awards to outstanding faculty. The fall convocation is the ceremony that traditionally opens the academic year.

“I think it is important that we focus our efforts on objectives that are important not only for our university but also for the entire region and state,” said Eakin.

He said his goals include positioning ECU for a campaign to raise $100 million in private gifts in 2007. He said ECU expects to raise more than $60 million in its current campaign that is scheduled to end in December. Eakin said he hoped to contain ECU’s student enrollment at around 20,000. This year ECU is expecting more than 17,000 to sign up for classes. Under his goal for the improvement of facilities, the chancellor said the construction of a new science and technology building on campus and the conversion of the East Campus as a campus for pedestrians were top priorities
Some of his other goals are:

  • Establish ECU as a national leader in public school reform and teacher training.
  • Establish ECU as the technological hub of eastern North Carolina.
  •  Establish ECU as the leader in outreach activities in our region.
  •  Place ECU in a major Division 1-A football conference and expand the stadium to 46,000 seats.

Monday’s assembly included the presentation of Alumni Association Teaching Excellence Awards to the faculty selected as the best of the 1994-95 year. They are: Linda K. Darty, a metals design professor in the School of Art, who won the award named for Robert L. Jones; Carroll Dashiell, a music professor in the School of Music, who received the Robert A. and Lina Worthington Mays Award; and Lester A. Zeager, an economics professor in the Department of Economics, who got the J.C. Bradford-Singleton-Blackwood Award.