The board of trustees expects reports this year on the state of the School of Engineering, the earthquake risks facing the University and the next 25 years of land use at Stanford, board President Leslie Hume said in an overview of the board’s agenda on Tuesday.

Hume spoke on campus after the October meeting of the board, the first for six new trustees named earlier this year. University President John Hennessy spoke to the board and the group walked through the new Science and Engineering Quad on west campus.

In a press briefing, Hume gave glowing reviews to Hennessy and Provost John Etchemendy Ph.D. ’82, who marked a decade in their respective roles last month.

“When you look back on these 10 years of when John and John have been partnered in leading this university, I think in the Stanford annals this will go down as one of the legendary times of Stanford history, not unlike the partnership of Fred Terman and Wally Sterling,” Hume said, referring to the provost and president who served together from 1955 to 1965.

She cited new facilities, fundraising efforts, financial aid expansion and the “excellence of our departments” as achievements of the past decade. In December, Hume herself will mark a 10-year milestone as a member of the board. She is set to step down when her second two-year term as president expires in June 2012.

After a spate of construction project approvals in June, the board approved no new projects this month, Hume said.

Regarding financial aid, Hume said the University’s commitment to the expanded program remains “ironclad.” Hennessy told the Faculty Senate last week that Stanford hopes to close the aid budget deficit in four to five years; meanwhile, some general funds are helping close the gap. That demonstrates Stanford’s dedication to financial aid, Hume said: “Those are dollars that could be allocated anywhere.”

“It’s an issue that keeps being raised as, ‘Are we really serious about this?’” Hume said. If parents wonder whether or not Stanford’s financial aid program is too good to be true long term, “that, I understand completely,” Hume said.

In December, School of Engineering Dean Jim Plummer M.S. ’67 Ph.D. ’71 is set to report to the trustees about the state of the school. Also that month, the board plans to discuss geologic and financial risks earthquakes pose to the University and its buildings. On the April agenda is a discussion of Stanford’s land use in the next 25 years, Hume said.

–– Elizabeth Titus