University President Jehuda Reinharz, along with the Board of Trustees, has created the Bold Ideas Group, which will be charged with formulating new initiatives that will increase Brandeis' academic profile and visibility "while simultaneously providing significant new revenue streams," according to the Brandeis University Web site. The members of the committee were announced at the Board of Trustees meeting, which took place last week and will meet for the first time on Monday, Nov. 16. Provost Marty Krauss, who will chair the committee, said that BIG will be exploring programs on the scale of the Rabb School for Continuing Studies. The School provided a new set of academic programs and has now become profitable for the University: It earns Brandeis about $2 million per year.

The Brandeis Web site says that the goal for any program created by BIG is to have "a positive return within three years of initiation and yield a steady-state positive net return of at least $2 million." Krauss said that the figure of $2 million was included to indicate the scale of the programs with which the group will be dealing. "There might be things we could do that might bring $100,000 to $200,000 more into the University; we're really looking for something bigger."

Krauss said that BIG is a continuation of a process begun in the fall of 2008, which looked at new, potentially profitable academic options for the University. These activities were put on hold during the rising financial crisis, but the BIG committee is a reawakening of that initial effort.

The Web site says that the committee will consider ideas proposed by the larger Brandeis community, and Krauss said that she would like to issue a "campuswide" invitation for people to submit ideas.

When asked what he thought he could bring to BIG, Director of the International Center for Ethics, Justice and Public Life Daniel Terris, a committee member, said that he started the division of Graduate Professional Studies at the Rabb School. Graduate Professional Studies offers programs in software engineering and related fields to people working in the high-tech field. "It turned out we were able to offer high quality applied programs to adult learners and at the same time generate revenue year in and year out for Brandeis, so that's the kind of winning program that I think we'll be looking to, to build on in a Big Ideas Group," Terris said.

Dean of the Heller School for Social Policy and Management Lisa Lynch, another committee member, wrote in an e-mail to the Justice that "given that the group has not even met it would be rather premature to make any comments."

The other committee members will be Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Jeffrey Apfel; Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment Jean Eddy; Director of the Master of Arts in Teaching program Marya Levenson; trustee Stuart Lewtan '84; Dean of the International Business School Bruce Magid; Vice Provost for Academic Affairs Michele Whelan; Director of the Office of the Arts Scott Edmiston; and Profs. Sylvia Fishman (NEJS), Paul Morrison (ENG), Tim Hickey (COSI), Daniel Pearlman (BIOL), Wendy Cadge (SOC) and Alice Kelikian (HIST).



-Miranda Neubauer contributed reporting.