In Our View: The Newest Husky

Abundant evidence supports the belief that Michael K. Young is a superb choice for new president at the University of Washington. Much of that evidence has more to do with financial and economic issues than higher education, but in modern universities, the president is more of an executive than an educator.

Young, 61, who comes to the UW after six years at the University of Utah, describes his new job as the equivalent to being mayor of a small city, CEO of a large medical system and in charge of hundreds of coaches and athletes — all simultaneously. That’s true, but the greatest potential benefit Young brings to Seattle is the economic impact he can have on the university, the city and the state. Gov. Chris Gregoire described Young as “an individual who understands a research university is a huge economic stimulus to a state if properly used. He’s got a very positive outlook that we’ll see our way through these tough times.”

Young’s importance to the university’s financial future cannot be ignored, nor can his success in Salt Lake City. There, with Young as president, the University of Utah increased its annual budget from $1.6 billion to $2.6 billion. And here’s what he can do for the city and state: The University of Utah leads the nation in spin-off companies generated from campus research; more than 100 businesses were created in the past five years. Officials in the Beehive State knew all about these statistics. That’s why they made Young the second-highest-paid public university president in the nation. His salary at Utah was $724,000; it remains to be negotiated at the UW.

Also during Young’s tenure at Utah, the university joined the Pac-12 athletic conference, and a Utah professor was a co-winner of the Nobel Prize. Clearly, he brings a dossier packed with achievements to his new job. He’ll need every bit of that — plus large doses of courage and determination — to confront the many challenges waiting for him at the UW. This is a university that’s held in high esteem around the world, but the Great Recession has brought immense difficulties in funding and tuition. According to The News Tribune in Tacoma, UW students paid a greater share of their education last year than did the state, and legislators are not through cutting. Double-digit percentage increases in tuition have descended upon students in each of the past two years and likely will continue.

The economic pressure has led the university to admit fewer in-state students and more out-of-state students, who pay higher tuition. That decision has been criticized by many factions, but it helps define the magnitude of the funding problem.

We don’t suspect Young can turn that adversity into boom times overnight. But while he was in Utah, the university created 7,500 jobs and $100 million in tax revenue as it passed the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as the nation’s top business-generating university.

There is one aspect of Young’s record of achievement that could become especially powerful here in the Northwest. He worked in the State Department under President George H.W. Bush, has expertise in international trade, and founded Japanese and Korean law programs while he was on the faculty at Columbia University. Seattle’s clout in Pacific Rim trade seems like a great place for Young.

The Seattle Times editorialized about the newest Husky: “His background in commercialization and management of intellectual property are gold mines, particularly at a top research institution such as the UW.”

Thousands of Huskies and UW fans in Southwest Washington and across the country have plenty of reasons to be excited about their university’s new leader.