No Silver Bullet

I wonder about the problem solving tactics employed on this campus. To me, it feels at times like the RIT decision makers ignore the root causes of problems and instead make monumental moves with their gut feelings as evidence of future success. That is probably an unfair judgment, but so it goes. Failure to provide compelling evidence for suspected improvements invites such modes of thinking.

Several administrators have commented to me that Global Village will be a training ground for students who seek to study abroad, thus fostering a more global reputation for the Institute. But, are students avoiding a semester overseas because they are too unprepared to travel, and do those same students think that living in faux-India will prepare them? I doubt it. I think the true problem lays in funding— study abroad is in many cases prohibitively expensive—and credits—study abroad semester credits often fail to map efficiently to our quarter system.

Per a couple of presentations I’ve heard at governance groups this year, the RIT Office of Development currently focuses on educating enrolled students on the importance of giving back to the Institute as a counter to lagging alumni donations. The assumption? Alumni do not give back because they don’t understand the importance of donating. I can’t imagine what sort of person came to that conclusion, and what sort of data they collected to back it up. RIT students know the value of money. They also know how this school makes them feel on a daily basis (hint: not good) and act accordingly upon graduation.

If RIT wishes to instill in its faculty an excited unity around the ideals of creativity and innovation (see RIT Finds A New Provost), then perhaps insults delivered to perfectly qualified and, indeed downright inspiring, professors (see SG Weekly Update) should be minimized. Requiring that each tenured faculty member possess a doctorate is not a guarantee that our “career-focused” Brick City will be staffed by the best and brightest innovators and educators. In all reality, I imagine that invalidates a number of otherwise stellar candidates.

Fred Brooks, a famous engineer, wrote an even more famous essay titled "No Silver Bullet: Essence and Accidents of Software Engineering." In this piece, he describes software as being essentially difficult, characterized by, among other things, its inherent physical invisibility (software systems are intangible) and its natural complexity (software systems are large and non-repetitive). Complex and intangible problems require sophisticated solutions, backed by consistent, focused, and incremental change. There is no silver bullet to slay that beast, no series of magical steps to fix the industry’s stagnant quality and growth.

I propose that RIT, too, holds within it a series of complex and intangible problems. And, just as software ailments cannot be slain with magical silver bullets, so too are RIT’s shortcomings protected from grandiose and jarring efforts. Transformation—I mean deep-seated, substantive transformation—is by necessity slow and painful. Educating students on the power of giving is silly at its best and insulting at its worst. Determining the specific reasons why RIT students do not donate on the same scale as Harvard and Yale students (and then making steps towards correcting some identified grievances) is a much more painful, yet exceedingly more worthwhile, process.