CIA's Tenet gives UO talk on the sly.

Byline: Greg Bolt The Register-Guard

CIA Director George Tenet made a secret visit Monday to the University of Oregon campus, where he addressed a national gathering of university presidents on the role of higher education in solving world problems.

The visit was conducted under tight security, and few outside the attending members of the Association of American Universities knew in advance that the head of the nation's overseas intelligence agency would speak. Tenet was on campus for about two hours and left without making any public appearances.

Tenet addressed a session on how America's leading research universities can help address problems such as war, terrorism, hunger and economic inequality, said AAU President Nils Hasselmo. His remarks were aimed more at exploring larger policy issues than offering specific direction for research efforts, he said.

"Mr. Tenet came here to address what are the broader issues that confront us in this nation and also to say something about the role of these research universities in addressing those issues and putting to use the creativity, the ability of innovation that defines these institutions," Hasselmo said during a meeting with reporters Tuesday. "He did not come here as CIA director; he really came here to look at broader policy issues that confront the government at this time."

UO spokeswoman Pauline Austin said Tenet traveled with his own security detail and that Eugene police provided additional support. She said the university was asked not to publicize his appearance on campus.

"We were asked not to tell people who didn't need to know about (Tenet's visit)," she said.

That included students, only a few of whom learned of the visit and then only after Tenet left. Megan Culver, a member of several groups that work out of the UO Survival Center, said some groups put up fliers later in the day aimed at the general AAU membership and addressing issues such as worker rights and animal testing.

She said student groups would have used the opportunity to express views on other issues if they had known of Tenet's visit. She said the CIA director had nothing more to fear than any other citizen, "unless he's afraid of questions, or more than that, the answers he'd have to give."

The AAU is an association of the nation's 62 top research universities that works to formulate policies on scientific and cultural research at the national level and work with Congress on issues related to research funding. The UO is the only AAU university in Oregon and, with the University of Washington, one of the only two in the Northwest. This is the first time the organization has held its semi-annual meeting in Oregon.

Hasselmo said the visit by Tenet resulted in an "interesting and constructive discussion" about the challenges facing the nation and the commitment of research universities to help meet them. Among issues of importance to universities is the exchange of international scholars and students, something that has become more difficult with the increased security measures put in place since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

AAU Vice Chairman Mark Wrighton, chancellor of Washington University in St. Louis, said that at a meeting last spring homeland security Secretary Tom Ridge reiterated the government's support for international scholarship. But Wrighton acknowledged that universities face new realities in the wake of the attacks.

"We have to be mindful that we are working in a new era," he said. "The post-9/11 era is different, and we need to be responsible in terms of having an understanding of where our students are and making sure they are coming here for the purposes they have declared."

Although the four-day session did not focus on the ongoing budget squeeze and rising tuition rates at universities across the nation, the topic dominated conversations among university presidents. UO President Dave Frohnmayer said the unprecedented level of disinvestment by states in higher education threatens America's status as the world leader in research, sapping its most valuable generator of economic growth.

"That troubles us all greatly," he said. "We had a paper as recently as this morning by one of our members showing essentially that the United States is on a nonsustainable strategy of disarming its highest and best research functions, which have contributed something like half the gross domestic product of this nation since the end of World War II."

AAU Chairman John Casteen, president of the University of Virginia, said schools are looking for new ways to maintain funding for the core academic mission. He noted that his university now requires all noneducational departments, including athletics and student housing, to make payments to the education and general budget from their revenues.

But Casteen said budget cutting by the states, with its resulting increase in tuition, cannot be sustained for long. He said when the public understands that continued cuts and higher tuition threaten not only the quality of education students receive but also the nation's economic health, they will demand that governments restore funding for universities.

"I have a feeling that in the end, the cost-control strategy is going to collapse, because there is in the American public a fundamental demand for quality in education," he said. "There is a basic issue of values built into this discussion. What I'm hoping will happen is that policy makers and legislators and others will fear the defensive outrage about the way in which costs have been shifted, but at the same time they will understand that the fundamental need for quality is tied to the need for economic development for a strong national economy."