We're in our first year of trying to get this (fundraising) campaign underway, so that's a biggie. We want to reflect a bit on what we're doing in enrollment as we try to become more diverse and enroll the quality of students we're enrolling.,”The Tribune sat down with University President the Rev. Robert A. Wild to get his take on past decisions, future plans and Marquette's Catholic identity. Here is the summary:

What are some of your goals for the year?

We're in our first year of trying to get this (fundraising) campaign underway, so that's a biggie. We want to reflect a bit on what we're doing in enrollment as we try to become more diverse and enroll the quality of students we're enrolling.

What's the status on the new campaign?

We haven't set a firm goal. We're going to do this campaign in two phases. In the first phase, we're basically focusing on three things. . The Law School and Engineering buildings are part of this phase. . The third, the most important, I want to underscore, is endowed student financial aid. We're gonna see what we can do about adding $200 million to the endowment.

Where does the endowment stand today?

As of June 30, it was $360 million. We took a nice jump over the last fiscal year, which is co-terminus with the academic year – July 1 – June 30. That was a slightly over 19 percent jump, so that was very encouraging. That will not happen every year. Frankly, we have more modest long-term goals about how much we expect to see the endowment increase year by year, but if we can continue to manage as well as we're doing now, that'll really help.

What would you consider some of the big successes of last year?

Certainly, fundraising was a big success. It was the first time we've ever had $100 million come in in one year. We were pretty pleased with enrollment last year and the number of applications. . I also think we're reaching our alums much better than we used to, which isn't simply important from a fundraising standpoint, because I think the more we network, the more it's going to help our graduates as they go out – just the level of contacts.

What were some of last year's challenges?

If we don't have challenges, we will be challenged. Students are good at holding our feet to the fire in terms of mission and that's good. Then you know you're getting somewhere. . We have to keep working on neighborhood relations and campus security, but that's something any urban school will continue to work on.

What did the administration learn from the South Africa program discussion and where will funding come from?

It is a very expensive program but I think one of the good things that happened out of that discussion was the benefits to the students were made much clearer and much stronger to the administration. . It's in this year's budget. Long term, of course, each budget is a new adventure. We like the program, so the bias is toward doing it. The ideal would be to get it funded by outside – either endowment or current funding from donors – but I know we're not there yet.

If you go back to the South

Africa or Gold decisions, do you think those were cases where students should've had more input from the beginning?

I guess if we would've raised it, we would've saved ourselves some angst both in South Africa and over here. At the time it seemed like we had to make one of these time bomb decisions in our mind. That may not have been fully correct, but that was sort of what I think was really going on in that.

How do you plan on increasing communication between the students and the administration?

What we try to do is get student input on issues that seem to have a wider impact on student experience. While good men and women can debate about where input is sought and where it's not, in some cases decisions simply have to be made within a defined timeframe. You're always, I find, balancing that out.

How do you try to fit programs such "The Vagina Monologues" with Marquette's Catholic identity?

That was a good example I think of where we found a middle way to accommodate a very controversial play that a number of women faculty included weren't real eager to see come on campus. I think we realized more that part of the attraction of "The Vagina Monologues" is that it gives particularly women permission to talk about sexuality issues. There's a real value there and you just didn't want to have the Church's views and teachings lost in the shuffle. I think the way of doing it as an academic project was a good way of proceeding, very in keeping with a Catholic university, so that was a happy compromise.

How do you respond to criticism the university has received over Dan McGuire's interpretation of Catholic doctrine?

I think it comes down to an issue of academic freedom. I think it works. I think there's always going to be on any Catholic campus or any campus someone who is pushing the envelope on questions that are highly controversial, but I just think that's the fact of life. . Universities are privileged platforms where an array of controversial topics ought to be discussed and ought to be able to be discussed.

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