Centralized / Decentralized Structure for Accomplishing University Outreach

As a land-grant and a sea-grant university, The University of Georgia has developed a concept of service (outreach) which rests upon the premise that university service faculty live and work among the people of the state, the proprietors of the University. It also rests upon the premise that the character of university outreach programs is determined by the people. Service faculty members are in the business of sensing change and devising university programs which bring to bear the resources of the university upon the challenges and problems that accompany change. New technologies, the readjustment of old programs to new challenges, and innovative methods for assisting the decision-making processes of a rapidly reconfiguring society are hallmarks of the Georgia concept.

The Georgia concept of service (i.e., outreach) places service on an equal and complementary footing with the teaching and research functions of the university. It emphasizes the delivery of outreach through a unique system of long-established institutes and centers which work in close harmony with programs in the university’s schools and colleges. It strives to imbue each faculty member with a sense of the obligation and excitement of outreach in the land-grant tradition.