There exists at some large public R1 universities an ‘entity’, let’s call it a quasi-academic unit, that seeks to bring the essence of a small liberal arts college education into the big campus milieu. This often includes a residential housing offering combined with small seminar-style classes given by full-time instructional faculty. If we call the entity an honors college, that captures both the academic competitiveness aspect that goes with the instruction and the idea of something like a real academic unit with its own decanal head. The term varies–at my institution, it is in fact, the Honors College–but the name varies. At Michigan, it’s the Residential College. The generic term is a living-learning community, but you get the idea. From a business standpoint, it’s a smart segmentation of the overall product, reminiscent of economy-plus seats on your favorite airline.
What if R1’s pursued something similar, but in the research rather than instructional domain? Imagine something like a mini-Caltech or -Rockefeller inside a Big Ten. Principal investigators inside the ‘thing’ might have an entirely different deal, more akin to HHMI extramural investigators. Darn, they might even have their own Janelia Farm lab building. Maybe they’d even have a residential option somewhat like University of Chicago’s MBL.
The idea is the same sort of business segmentation as the honors college, and it might add value. Faculty might even self-select to belong to the research-living community.
You think it’d never fly? People rail at airlines the segment everything in the flying experience to separate charges, but they do fly them. The segmentation adds value.
Discoverers and Discoveries 