New Faculty,
Staff Explore State on Bus Tour
By Matt Minchew
Staff Writer
Thirty rookie faculty and staff members. Five days. 1,100 miles. One bus.
The trip's scenic route around the state, including stops ranging from rural
Yadkinville to urban Charlotte, left the travelers with closer relationships
to fellow faculty members and a better sense of being North Carolinians.
"The point of the whole tour was to emphasize issues facing North Carolina and
the community," said UNC Director of Community Relations Linda Douglass.
The 16-stop tour, an annual event since 1997, was the brainchild of late Chancellor
Michael Hooker. The tour, organized primarily by people who have previously
been on the trip, is designed to give newer faculty members a chance to learn
about both the state and each other.
The itinerary of the trip has changed from year to year as coordinators learn
from each experience. This year's trip included visits to Fort Bragg in Fayetteville,
a high-tech textile mill in Yadkinville and an elementary school in Warrensville.
Tour leader Mike Smith, director of UNC's Institute of Government, said listening
to elementary school students speak about their school and programs was "a powerful,
inspiring experience."
Smith said giving faculty and staff of different departments a chance to mingle-an
experience that might otherwise never occur on a large campus like UNC's-is
a valuable one.
Smith added that he feels confident the visits around the state provided insight
into North Carolina's past and present, and gave the new faculty members a great
chance to network and form support groups for each other. The tour also gives
participants, many of who are from out of state, an overview of issues facing
North Carolina.
William Furman, an anesthesiologist and new member of UNC's Medical School faculty
since about a year ago, works with liver transplant patients. Furman said it
was important for him to form a quick sense of trust with his patients-a trust
that will be easier to form now that he has seen many of the places where his
patients are from throughout the tour.
"We have students who come from different ways of life and different environments,"
Furman said. "Now I've seen them."
Though the stops of the tour change each year, the value of the trip for new
faculty members has remained constant.
"It's a great purpose and has great impact," Smith said.
As a new faculty member, Furman said one benefit of the tour is the relationships
he formed with faculty from other departments.
"Tours like this lay a groundwork that is impossible otherwise," Furman said.
"There was something about every trip that was memorable."
Matt Minchew can be reached at minchew@email.unc.edu.