In last September’s Fall Preview issue of The Minnesota Daily, reporters profiled 14 members of the University community as “newsmakers,” people who shaped the University behind the scenes and in public. In this, the last regular edition of the 1996-97 academic year, the Daily looks back at the newsmakers and what they did to influence University affairs.
Richard Pfutzenreuter
As leader of the Office of Budget and Finance, Pfutzenreuter was responsible for formulating the University’s budget request for the state Legislature.
Pfutzen-reuter was active at the Capitol, giving presentations and outlining funding proposals for the University’s budget to the higher education committees.
While the Legislature did not fully fund the University’s request, the University will receive a $151 million boost over the next two years.
Roger Paschke
Paschke, who was considered essential to meeting University challenges such as financing a new steam plant, became a campus non-entity, leaving halfway through the year. He had been the University treasurer and associate vice president for Finance and Operations for the past five years, when he suddenly resigned in January. He had worked for the University for 18 years.
Paschke took a job at an insurance company in Bermuda. He was replaced as treasurer by Jo Anne Jackson.
Marvin Marshak
Marshak, the senior vice president for Academic Affairs, was easily one of the most visible figures on campus this year. He led the University effort to lobby the Legislature for the University’s biennial budget, worked with faculty members to end the tenure debate, and participated heavily in the presidential search process.
However, the end of his first year as vice president appears to be his last, as president-designate Mark Yudof is consolidating administration posts and eliminating Marshak’s position.
Marshak, a tenured physics professor, might go back to teaching.
Chris Boik
Boik was one of three current University students to run for the state Legislature in 1996. However, all three student candidates faced incumbents with heavy support in their districts, and each received less than 35 percent of the vote in their district. When the elections were over, they dropped out of the news.
Bob Baker
Baker, the director of Parking and Transportation Services, has had a busy year, trying to save the 52 busline and implementing parking cost increases.
Parking Services announced May 27 that daily rates and off-peak rates at University lots will increase by 25 cents. This increase is expected to generate an additional $600,000.
At the same time, Transportation Services has announced that the 52 busline, which was slated to terminate its routes in June, will be continued for at least one more year.
Helen Phin/Eric Hanson
As president and vice-president of the Minnesota Student Association in the 1996-97 school year, Phin and Hanson oversaw the year and made changes in the MSA Forum.
Both students have been active in the selection of a new food service, getting students involved in the selection of the new University president, and attempting to open student evaluations of teachers as public records.
The only major controversy in the forum this year was over a resolution to take down a portrait of Margaret Sanger, when some students questioned her support for eugenics, a pseudoscience that asserts that certain groups of people are genetically superior. The resolution overwhelmingly passed, but the portrait remained.
Fred Morrison
Morrison, a law professor and faculty senator, contributed to the new University tenure code. He was definitely a newsmaker this year.
The year-and-a-half-long tenure debate is winding down, as the University senate endorsed a new code Wednesday. Now the Board of Regents must approve the plan to finalize it.
Morrison served on the Committee of Eight, a group of faculty leaders who wrote the new tenure code. The new code was approved by both University President Nils Hasselmo and Regents Chairman Tom Reagan.
Joy Rikala
Rikala is the head of the University’s police force. She is one of only four female chiefs in the state.
Overall, the University police can claim that this has been a good year. Statistics released in February show that thefts, burglaries, vehicle break-ins, and sex crimes were all reduced from the previous year.
Kim Isenberg
Isenberg continues to work in the Board of Regents office. While she did not make any headlines this year, Isenberg was very involved in settling the tenure debate. Her job was to communicate tenure issues to the Regents so they could adequately handle the issue.
Isenberg also served as a liaison to student representatives, providing information to students.
Robert McKinnell
When frogs with extra legs were discovered in Minnesota and nationwide last year, McKinnell and several of his biology and genetics students set about researching these changes.
McKinnell has studied cancer in frogs for the University over the past 39 years, and believes that he is now in a position to isolate why the changes are occurring. He plans on using the summer to do field tests on more abnormal frogs.
Mark Brenner
Brenner, the vice president for Research and dean of the Graduate School, might be looking for a new job, as Yudof has announced a national search for a new graduate school dean. However, Brenner can reapply for his job, which he has held for three years.
The University’s graduate programs have come under fire this year. A U.S. News and World Report study on graduate school rankings earlier this year shows that the University is slipping in rankings in several graduate programs, notably law, education, and engineering. Brenner has said a lack of funding has led to the drop in quality, and fears that the University will slip more if funding is not increased to some areas.

Jane Toleno
Toleno is the director of Disability Services at the University. She has fought this year to increase the parking spots on campus for disabled students and faculty members.
Currently, only about 300 to 400 parking spots out of an estimated 20,000 are available for disabled students. However, little has changed, and Toleno was not in the news much this year.
Ruth Bettendorf
Bettendorf resigned as president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees early in the school year.
However, the merger of University Hospital and Fairview Riverside Medical Center in January ended AFSCME’s official status as the employees’ union. A renewed union drive, in which Bettendorf remained a vocal activist, led to another vote in May. In that election two of the three employee units once represented by AFSCME rejoined the union.