 Okay. I think it's 6.30 and I am going to call this special Board of Trustees meeting to order. We're welcoming all the attendees and everyone else that may be watching live stream. This is a listening session and I welcome all of you to this. It's on the recommended proposed name for the new institution that will be launched in July 20 of 23 unifying Castleton University, Northern Vermont University and Vermont Technical College. I want to point out that there is a link on the chat room that will allow people to continue to sign up and after five minutes of the meeting we will close that link down. So if you want to say something and you haven't signed up please do so now. I'll give people a chance to do that. We have received many, many several hundred written public comments in preparation for today's meeting. We've reviewed them and in addition we've had many speakers signed up to speak this evening. Again, sign up now if you are interested in speaking. To ensure that as many people as possible have an opportunity to speak we would like to make your comments concise and succinctly as possible as a courtesy to your fellow speakers. We want to hear from as many people as we can. Jen Porial will call those who are signed up to speak one by one. She will announce who will be the next speaker so that person can be ready when they're called upon. When your name is called please unmute yourself and provide your feedback. We're asking speakers to share their feedback within three minutes or less. At the two and a half minute mark you will be prompted to conclude your remarks. Again the goal is to make sure that as many voices as reasonably possible can be heard. At the conclusion of the listening portion of the meeting the trustees will have an opportunity to discuss the recommended name, the feedback they've received and to ask any questions they may have before voting on the recommendation. At the conclusion before we open the listening session I would ask the chancellor to provide a brief summary of the work that has gone into this naming recommendation and the transformation and to ask any questions they may have before voting on the recommendation or excuse me wrong line and where we are on the process and what further work needs to be done. So we are going to hear from the chancellor to give a very brief history of what has transpired over the past six months to a year. If we can start with that. Chancellor Sudatni. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yeah I just thought it would be helpful for us to recap why we're here and then the build up to why we're deciding on the name tonight. We did just conclude doing town hall meetings around the different campuses so some of what I'm including here is really to help answer some of the questions that came up as part of those town hall meetings. So why we're here is really to answer the question of you know why we're combining our three residential colleges into a new single institution of higher education that will be launched in the summer of 2023 and we're also looking to answer why the board is being asked to select a name for the new institution. To answer those questions we really need to go back about 18 months to the spring of 2020. The Vermont state college system was on an unsustainable financial trajectory meaning that expenses exceeded revenues so more money was going out the door than was coming in. The situation had been growing worse since 2012 and the size of the structural deficit that the system had was increasing. In March 2020 the disruption caused by the pandemic pushed the system to the brink for several reasons. Some of those included the refunds of room and board to students when they went home, the loss of summer camps and conferences and other collateral sources of revenue and also the increased costs that came from switching to delivering education remotely as well as testing and all the other costs associated with COVID. Each of the three residential colleges within the system so Castleton University, Northern Vermont University and Vermont Technical College all faced varying financial challenges and all of those together placed the entire system at risk. The legislature provided funding to assist with the immediate financial challenges last year and to help cover some of the costs we incurred due to the pandemic. The legislature then also created the select committee on the future of public higher education in Vermont and that committee was charged with addressing the urgent needs of the Vermont state college system and developing an integrated plan for a high quality affordable and workforce connected future. So earlier this year back in February the board voted to adopt the transformation recommendations of the select committee and after conducting focus groups, interviews, meetings with stakeholders, they also met with other folks that had proposals for what the future of the Vermont state college system could look like. The select committee had unanimously recommended that the Vermont state college system bring together Castleton University, Northern Vermont University and Vermont Technical College under a single accreditation and a single leadership structure. They also recommended that administrative services be consolidated across the system, minimizing duplication and making sure we had consistent system-wide business practices. The select committee also recommended that the Vermont state colleges could reduce their structural deficit which they estimated to be about 25 million dollars over a five-year period by taking these actions coupled with an increase of around 17 and a half million dollars in the state's annual base appropriation to the system. The select committee also recommended that the state provide bridge funding to help cover the gap between the revenues and expenses while the Vermont state college system work to reduce its structural deficit. So the state funding, the state has given the Vermont state colleges a mandate to implement the transformation and has provided significant funding support and this includes an additional five million dollars to the annual base appropriation, 21 million in bridge funding for this fiscal year to address the system structural deficit, 20 million dollars to cover transformation costs and around 20 million in free tuition, scholarships and other forms of financial support that have gone directly to students to reduce the cost of tuition. It's critical that our transformation be successful both in bringing together the three institutions to create a new university and the consolidation of administrative services system wide. We need to do it in order for the system to continue to receive the increased state financial support that it needs to maintain its current campus locations and to deliver accessible and affordable education across the state of Vermont. One of the recommendations that did come out of the select committee report was that we continue to maintain all of our rural campuses that we have within the system right now to effectively implement the change management required to bring the three institutions together into a single new combined entity and to do the administrative consolidations. The Vermont state college system is taking an organized project management approach to the transformation to ensure that the new university has a solid and sustainable foundation that delivers the education that both the students and the state expect and need. Since the board's decision in February to approve the select committee's recommendations, many people have been working across the system on transformation with the goal of launching the new university by July of 2023. So this includes the 85 faculty members that worked on developing the programs that will be taught at the new university as well as those faculty leaders that are working on the faculty governance processes for the new university. It also includes the more than 100 employees from across the system who are currently already participating on one or more project or core teams or sub teams and there will be many others that will be involved moving forward. These teams are actively engaged in doing the work that's necessary to answer the numerous questions about the new university such as what programs will be taught at the new university? How will the new university's academic programs be organized? For example, will it be by schools, colleges, institutes, academic centers, etc? Which sports will be played and where? What residential options will be offered? How will our physical footprint change? Where will the $25 million reduction in the structural deficit come from? And what is the strategic financial plan for the next five years? So among the first major decisions for the new university are the name and the mission and the vision. So the name is essential both for our admission staff who are already out on the road recruiting for the fall of 2022, but those students needless to say need to know what's going to be happening, what the name will be for the new university that they will be attending come fall of 2023. And it's also critical the mission and vision be developed because that helps to inform the many other transformation decisions and the branding for the new institution. So turning to the naming recommendation, back in April, the Vermont State College system put out a public request for proposals for audience research, name and brand strategy, and content and design strategy for print and digital collateral. Vision point marketing was selected after an extensive screening and review process, which included presentations by the four finalists to a large audience composed of representatives from across the three institutions. In addition to recommending a name and developing a brand strategy, vision point was also asked to conduct research on the mission and vision for the new university as well. The naming recommendation is only the first step. It's the first deliverable in the vision points work. The next steps include developing the brand pillars and personality, the messaging around the new university, and finally the logo and trademarks. Prior to making the naming recommendation, vision point conducted 31 listening sessions with leadership, faculty, staff, students, alumni and community members, as well as some individual interviews with students and senior leaders. They conducted a brand perception study with over 3000 internal campus community and external stakeholder respondents. They conducted a virtual brand workshop with 25 participants from across the three institutions, and they did deep dive research on each of the three institutions to understand their existing missions, visions, values, histories, geographies and demographics. To be clear, vision point was not asked to research or test market any specific name, but was free to explore whatever naming recommendation and branding strategy. They concluded was supported by their research. At the board's last meeting held on September 21st, vision point presented their recommendation that the name of the new university be Vermont State University. And why they chose that name, the Vermont concept was most popular when aggregating the opinions of the brand perception study respondents across audience groups. It was the first choice among state residents, alumni, faculty and staff. The top associations with the Vermont concept were supporting the vitality of rural communities, accessible to learners of all backgrounds and artistic and cultural vibrancy. The top associations for state included accessibility to learners of all backgrounds, diversity, equity and inclusion and supporting the vitality of rural communities. Again, some of these concepts came up in several different places. University was also identified as being critical to communicate the prestige, quality and level of education provided. The other theme that was prominent in the research was advancement, innovation and technology, namely transformative student experiences, a focus on innovation and technology and pioneering education. Vision point explained their recommendation by noting that the name emphasizes the state of Vermont and conveys strong aspects of being a public entity such as accessibility, affordability and a mission to serve people. It also built on the brand of Vermont, the state is viewed positively, regionally, nationally and internationally. The naming structure also provides a unifying platform for the three institutions as they're brought together as a new university under a single leadership and a single accreditation. The simplicity and clarity of the name also offers flexibility and customization as we continue the brand development process. So, for example, we can add identifiers such as by locations and by signature programs. The name reflects and reinforces the idea that Vermont is our campus, given that the new university will have a presence across the state between its five residential campuses, its decentralized nursing sites and its Killington based resort and hospitality management program. Vermont State University uses a successful and well-recognized naming convention that exists in many other states. So, in short, the name reflects what the new university will be. It will be based across Vermont, it's a state institution and it delivers a breadth of high quality academic programs. So, that is the summary I wanted to provide to you. And I'm happy to answer any questions later on after the you've heard from everybody through the listening session. Thank you, Chancellor Zedotny. If we are ready now, Jen, you can call on the first speaker, please. Speaker, I would like to call on Melissa Weinstein. We're going to unmute you, ask you to unmute and then you can provide your comment, please. And Corbin Loomis, you will be next. Melissa, are you not here anymore? We're hearing she may not be here anymore. Melissa left. Corbin Loomis, if you're here, we're going to ask you to unmute and you can provide your comment. And Megan Meacham, you're on deck. Jen, I just want to add in the chat there are comments about how to unmute. So, can you just explain what the process is? I'm guessing that tech support is actually making it a bit possible for people to unmute themselves, but I don't know what the process is here, but obviously people are struggling with that. We click on a button and we ask you to unmute. So, you will get a message on your screen saying you may now unmute and then you unmute yourself and then you can speak. We will not see you on camera, but you can unmute yourself once we have clicked our button on our end asking you to unmute. So, until we do it on our end, you will not see that option. And you can put your hands down. We will call you when we get to you. So, I'm going to assume that Corbin Loomis is not here. Let's move on to Megan Meacham and Gabrielle Tamasi is on deck. Megan Meacham, we will ask you to unmute. Can you hear me okay? Yes. All right. I love being the first guinea pig. Good evening and thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak. For those that don't know me, my name is Megan Meacham. I'm an alum of Linden and I'm currently the Chair of the Journalism and Communications Department on that campus. Five years ago, I believe to the day, the Vermont Board of Trustees voted to unify Linden and Johnson. And a few short months later, we were renamed to Northern Vermont University. What has been accomplished in those five years is the result of a lot of hard work on the part of our faculty and staff and a lot of faith from our students who believed in us and the programs we deliver. We've done some pretty incredible things and we've learned a lot through unifying, but we've also overcome a lot of obstacles. We're a pretty resilient bunch. I don't think any of us imagined that five years later we'd be facing another name change and unification, but here we are taking on the challenge of another new name and a system-wide transformation that will hopefully streamline and bring some growth to the Vermont State College system. One of the things that helps Linden and Johnson campuses while dealing with an identity change is remembering our sense of place. When we talk about NVU, we talk about it as one university working across two campuses, but we also talk about it as the Linden campus and the Johnson campus, which is important because those places mean something. I do hope that with the new Vermont State University name, we can have some sense of place when we talk about each of the campuses and what they offer. So, Linden at Johnson, at Casselton, at Randolph, at Williston. These places are not just towns, they're lifebloods of our institutions and they give us our identities, and in addition, they carry the history of our institutions with them. I think all of us need some assurances that marketing this newly branded combined entity will happen better than it did with NVU. There are many nationally recognized programs that are still reeling from the last brand change at NVU, and we are depending on you to really do it right this time if the name changes. I also understand the frustrations and emotions that have been coming from others within the system, but I think it's important to remember that while change can be hard, it can also be exciting, and we're all part of the same team. Now is not the time to finger point or poor fact throwing out into the ethosphere. We succeed and fall together. This can be an opportunity to reinvent and create new opportunities for our students, and they deserve our best efforts. I just wanted to let you all know that I'm ready to support the name of Vermont State University as a faculty member, should that be the decision today? Because regardless of the name that we carry, Linden will always be Linden at its core, and our students know what our campuses have to offer, so thank you. Okay, thank you. Gabrielle Tamasi, we're going to ask you to unmute, and Melissa Weinstein, we hear your back, and you're on deck, please. Hello. Can you all hear me? My name is Gabrielle Tamasi. I am a 2012 graduate of Castleton, a 2015 graduate of Vermont Law School, and a current Vermont State employee. There are a lot of feelings going on right now, and anyone who has done the majority of the work in a group project knows exactly how the Castleton community feels right now. Castleton saw the changing field of higher education decades ago, and put in the work of updating their model to be prepared. Castleton worked with intentionality to create brand recognition and grow that brand in Vermont throughout the country and across the world, while the state college system faced years of decline Castleton saw over a decade of growth. In 2015, I had the privilege of working at the State House and attending the Vermont State College Committee meeting where Castleton was granted preliminary approval to change from a state college to a university. It was a moment where Castleton was recognized and applauded by the board for the growth that had been demonstrated. Added graduate programs, a presence in Rutland, international student recruitment, and it was done without losing the identity of the small college with a big heart. So, at that time, Castleton has only continued to grow and expand with campuses now in Killington and Bennington and an articulation agreement with Vermont Law School. From the Castleton name and Spartan mascot down to the small detail of Castleton Green, we're known and respected. It would be a detriment to the entire state college system to lose this strong identity. Thank you. Okay, Michelle Weinstein, we're going to ask you to unmute and then Emily White, you're on deck. Hi, can you hear me? Great. I'm Melissa Weinstein and I live in Thetford. I'm a former employee of the Vermont State College system where I worked for about 13 years. I started as the web editor at what was then Johnson State College, and my last position was the associate director of communications for NVU. It's been a few years since I've been a VSCS employee, but I remain a strong supporter of this critical resource for Vermont. And it's in that context that I wanted to just voice my support tonight for the board, approving the name Vermont State University for the new institution. I, having been through the unification of JSC in London State into NVU, I'm acutely aware of the logistical and emotional challenges that such a significant change creates. Our well-justified sense of campus pride and history is very connected to our name, and rebranding can feel like a betrayal, and I super get it. But the fact is, this isn't the first or even the second time that Johnson, Lyndon and Castleton have changed their names in order to meet the demands of an evolving educational marketplace. First, we were normal schools, then we became state colleges, and now we're universities, and we're looking towards a next iteration. And while the name may change, the people in the programs that make our campuses unique won't. But connecting the campuses under the name Vermont State University will create some significant advantages in a highly competitive higher ed marketplace. We need to attract out of state and international students, in addition to serving the students of Vermont. We need to do this to enrich our campus communities and to strengthen the economic health of our system. And they're in doing that into reaching out to the people who don't know us by name. There is no more critical tool than the internet for doing that. That is the primary way that students find the colleges that they're going to. Vermont has a historic opportunity right now to leverage our national visibility as a safe, peaceful and public health minded place to live and learn. And as families consider sending their children to Vermont and begin the college research journey, the keyword rich name Vermont State University lays all of our cards on the table and will get us to the top of the first page of search results. And it's hard to imagine a more search engine friendly name, which I cannot stress enough how significant that is to our ongoing success. Our former names and histories will live on the unique strengths of each campus' people and programs will continue to be a part of the story of our transformed institution. But the short term challenges and costs, and there are costs, of course, of such a change are worthwhile investment in the strong, visible and stable future of a system that is essential to the cultural and economic health of Vermont. And I appreciate you hearing me. Thank you. Thank you, Melissa. I am told Emily is not here. So James Osborn, sorry to take you by surprise, but if you're here, we're going to unmute you and Dr. Felicia Darling, you are on deck. You unmuted me even though you said you were going to unmute somebody else. I don't know. Did you want me to speak? Who are you? I'm Felicia Darling. Felicia, please speak. Okay, I'm here. Okay, great. I'm Felicia Darling. I got my bachelor's degree at Johnson and my master's at Linnon State College, and I got a really top notch world-class education there. I went on to Stanford and got my PhD building on the expertise that I gained at Linnon and Johnson. So I'm really grateful to have gone there. I think it changed my life, and I did not have any inadequacies. When I got to Stanford, people went to Cornell and Harvard, blah, blah, blah, and I went to those state colleges and I was super prepared. And I want to say that I worked in higher ed in California now for about 15 years at the UCs, which are like UVM, and the CSU's California State Universities, which is very much like this Vermont State University idea. That's why I like that name. I can really relate to that. And I love this idea of Vermont State Universities, and it can be just like the CSU's California State Universities where it's regional, right? California State University East Bay, California State University Humboldt, or wherever they are. So I like that you can keep the region, but you've also integrated the whole Vermont State University system. And furthermore, I really hope that in the future, there are articulation agreements with the Vermont community colleges, because I've taught in community colleges in Vermont and here. And in California, they have these great articulation agreements where the California community colleges are so top notch that you go right from there to the California State Universities. And I would love to see that happen with the Vermont State University system as well. That's all I wanted to say. Thank you, Felicia. Okay. Do we have Andrew Kramer here? We do not. So I'm going to go to Andre Fleisch. We're going to unmute you, Andre. And Hannah Manley is on deck. All right. Hello. Good evening. Thank you very much. I'm Andre Fleisch, Professor of History at Castleton University. I'm not tonight here to protest the renaming of the system, Vermont State University, which I think is in some ways a commendable name. Instead, I'd like to point out that so far, we have not been given a clear or compelling explanation for why the campuses cannot retain their names, mascots, colors and branding while operating under the umbrella of VSU. In such a scenario, we could still carry out a silent merger of administration programs and course catalogs. Without the pain and controversy, the potential loss of identity is causing. Significant evidence suggests that this was the original intent of the legislative committee. I recall that Senator Baruch was quoted as saying last spring, he did not understand the controversy over the naming because we have become, quote, just like the SUNYs. And it is no secret that the University of Maine system was an important model in this restructure. Well, as I'm sure you all know, the SUNYs, the University of Maine system and every unified system of higher education in the country I know of all retain unique mascots and branding at each of their campuses. The NCHEMS report also emphasized the importance of preserving the history, tradition and heraldry of each campus. There's no financial reason to insist on a completely centralized brand. In fact, it will cost hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars to replace everything from office letterhead to signage to our athletic uniforms to the floors of our gyms and the turf of our stadium. That strikes me as beyond wasteful in our current situation. I can only conclude that the insistence on a complete rebranding comes from an unswerving ambition for centralization at all costs. I ask the board to take a different path. Please approach this decision with moderation, modesty and wisdom. Please show us that you're not only listening but hearing the overwhelming desire expressed by our communities, our students and our alumni to retain the unique identities they value. Thank you. Thank you, Andre. We need to skip ahead some people that aren't here and I apologize for springing this on you. David Mook, are you available to speak? We will ask you to unmute please. And Shyvana Bent, you are on deck. Yes, I am available to speak. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Okay, great. I want to comment on two topics, mission and vision. I was happy to listen to two presentations by Nolan Atkins on the work of the committee to draft a vision statement answering the key questions. Who are we? What do we aspire to be? And a mission statement to answer what do we do and why? And on page 50 of the select committee report, they note that it's going to be very important to have refined missions for each of the institutions because these refined missions will be needed to guide the transformation process. So defining the missions after the process is a year in or complete really doesn't make a lot of sense. Finally, a list of keywords and concepts that will be considered in drafting that vision and mission is evolving nicely, becoming more student focused and finally include such concepts as a whole person, not just workers, community engagement, all aspects of the community, not just the workplace, programs with national and global relevance, not just serving the Vermont economy. Hopefully this work is moving toward what Jane Goodall sees as the true purpose of higher education, the development of our human potential, not merely workforce development. That may be a fine focus for community college of Vermont or Vermont Tech, but not for a legitimate university that's trying to attract students from worldwide. Sadly, the problem is that the plan was approved and launched without having first developed a meaningful vision and mission. And Nolan acknowledged that that should have been done prior to launching the transformation plan. And I would add prior to hiring expensive consultants, we can fix it later, he said. The fixing it later is expensive and redundant in terms of time and energy. And some things cannot be fixed later, which brings me to my second point, the naming. I was a student at Virginia Tech in the 60s. And we were transitioning from an all male military institute to a state university. So Virginia Polytechnic Institute and state university became the name. But we were already known as Virginia Tech, and we're still known as Virginia Tech. And they didn't take that that naming away that just added and state university. And so my suggestion is similar to what Virginia Tech did, add a tagline to each individual entity on page 56 of the select committee's plan. It says that the individual entities, it's important to maintain them and their cultures. And we have not been given no assurance that that will happen. But my suggestion will be add a tagline to each entity, Castleton of Vermont State University, Northern Vermont University, a state of Vermont State University, Montana Tech has Montana Tech of the University of Montana. This would be very easy to do to maintain those identities, which I think is important for any number of reasons. Last three minutes, David. Can I ask you to wrap up, please? Okay, yep. I'll wrap up. My final statement is, although the current plan walks back to the previous chancellor's proposal to close the campuses, it's still an austerity driven plan. Asterity is a downward spiral with now good end. And I believe it would be good to put a pause on this transformation for the moment until a meaningful vision and mission is fully developed and approved by the board so that the transformation plan proceeds based on a meaningful mission and vision and not just a workforce centered future. Thank you very much. Okay, Shyvana, your next, we'll ask you to unmute and Tobias Duke, you're on deck. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Great. My name is Shyvana Bent. I'm a 2018 alum of Johnson or Northern Vermont University. And I'm currently a graduate student at MIT and one solar oceanographic institution. And I would just like to sort of speak to the Castleton alum on the call when I first read that the alums were upset about the name changing. I was also a little bit hurt, but they didn't want to have a name that would reflect all of Vermont. But then I thought back to the naming process for Northern Vermont University and how many emotions are tied up in it. And I just wanted to recognize the sort of the pain that comes with this transition, but to echo what has been said earlier, that change can be a really good thing. And I just think that five years ago, looking at making the transition from Johnson State College to Northern Vermont University, I honestly kind of thought it would be a disaster, even though it was helping head it up. It seems like a really daunting task. But I do think that it's possible, but only if we get buy-in from each campus. And that has happened before as we've been the model of it. And I also just think that having the entire university system be named Castleton University, although there's great examples of them having satellite campuses, just doesn't allow for the maintenance of these different towns and identities. I grew up in Randolph. I went to Johnson. London is a beautiful place. And so is Castleton. And I think that just echoing what has been said, the name of Vermont has the ability to encompass that all without focusing in on any one institution. And so it allows us all hopefully to compromise and have that sort of buy-in. And yeah, I guess not to be a lovey-dovey, but I really am just hoping that we are able to work together for the betterment of the Vermont State Colleges and Vermont State University, because I think that is really the goal here. And it's hard to keep that in mind sometimes when it is painful and it can hurt. But I do believe that it's the best choice moving forward. And I really like the name. So thank you. Thank you, Shyvana. Kay, we're going to ask Tobias Duke to unmute and Beth Walsh, you are on deck. Hi, can everybody hear me? Yes, we can. Excellent. Good evening, Madam Chair, Madam Vice Chair, Madam Chancellor, and other esteemed members of the Board of Trustees. My name is Tobias Duke, and I am a senior at Castleton University studying studying music and business. Although I had the opportunity to speak with members of the transformation team and Chancellor's Office at the Town Hall hosted by Castleton University this past Friday, I also wanted to share my thoughts on the new name at tonight's meeting, and I'm honored to have the opportunity to do so. Having read through Vision Points presentation on the proposed name change several times, I wanted to address a couple of topics. Firstly, as I mentioned in my speech at Friday's Town Hall, if you direct your attention to the top of the Castleton University website, you'll notice a logo that reads Castleton of Vermont University. Given what I've heard from other callers, I think this would be a very nice way to address some of the concerns if we could name some of the different institutions, Castleton of Vermont State University, Linden of Vermont State University, and so forth. While I understand the proposed name is meant to encompass the new colleges and college entities' commitment to an education that benefits Vermont and Vermonters first, I would like to argue that Castleton's current positioning is not an attempt to remove ourselves from our location in Vermont or role in the larger community. As part of orientation weekend, every incoming student to Castleton spends a portion of their time volunteering and giving back to the community. When I was a student orientation staff leader for the incoming students during the 2020-2021 academic year, even though we were facing a pandemic that forced us to completely rethink and change our plans from what has happened in the past, we still managed to give back to the community through creating bags of donations for those in need during the pandemic. Although it might seem like a small act, being able to help the larger community beyond our campus was something that I felt grateful for and encompasses a portion of what we here in Castleton call the Castleton way. My next point I wanted to discuss involves the comparisons drawn by vision point throughout their presentation with a particular focus on the similarly named institutions. If we take the combined enrollment figures for Castleton University, Northern Vermont University and Vermont Technical College, we would have around 7,500 students total. That's assuming most of them decide to remain as students at the new institution. Of the colleges and universities named in vision points presentation, none of them have enrollment figures below 20,000 students. While I understand that they are the closest entities in terms of the literal name to the new proposed Vermont State University, these five named comparisons are not reflective of the community feel that each of the VSCS campuses currently offers its students. Furthermore, the point was raised at least once during Friday's town hall that the population of Vermont is dwindling and has been on a steady decline in recent years. I ask you now, I ask you now how will it be possible to continually increase enrollment in a new university if you're focusing on Vermont first. I had one more point, but I will skip to my conclusion for time's sake. Now that I've had the opportunity to voice my feedback on the proposed name change, I want to leave you all with this last one idea. Throughout Friday's town hall, I heard members of the transformation team repeatedly mentioned that students' best interest is at the heart of various discussions that are occurring. While I understand that there are many perspectives on the new college entity's name and many other topics involving the transformation, if students really are at the core of many decisions relating to the transformation, I'm hoping you will take my views and those of my peers and treat them as such. Thank you for your time and I look forward to the board making the right decision in the end. Thank you Tobias. Beth Walsh, we will unmute you now and Bill McGrath, you are on deck. Thank you. I'm Beth Walsh. I am the director of career development at NVU Johnson and the president of the Vermont State College's United Professionals. Over the past 18 months, our campuses have been through a lot of turmoil and when Jeb Spalding proposed closing three of our campuses, he did great damage. We are still feeling it, but his actions also caused a coming together of many in our institutions. Many of us know that we all need each other. One way that the Vermont State College's system has benefited our individual institutions is by lending funds when budgets didn't balance and those funds came from all of us. Each of our campuses serve our students, our communities and our state. Some of the students who enter our doors are surprised to even be in college. They honestly didn't think it was possible. Some don't complete their studies, but many do and we change their lives. And I know that our campuses are the only paths to a four-year degree for many of our students. I can tell you that my colleagues and I are all pretty tired. If the pandemic wasn't enough, throwing some job insecurity, positions left vacant and extra committee work to create a new entity. The state of Vermont needs all of us. I'm looking forward to the next few years of working hard and coming together as Vermont State University and Lyndon Johnson Randolph-Castleton, Williston and all around the state. The state of Vermont is our campus. Thank you for your hard work. I'm excited for the future and for a stronger and more sustainable Vermont State University. Thank you. Thank you, Beth. Bill McGrath, we're going to ask you to unmute and Steve Cormier. You are on deck. Hi, we can hear you. Hi, excellent. My name is Bill McGrath. I'm a 1997 and 1999 graduate of VTC's Electro Mechanical Program. I was also a residence director, which makes me part of the staff. I was also a professor of electrical and computer engineering, which was part of the faculty. And most of all, I was a student trustee for two years, which means I sat on the very board you guys are on. My thought is let's just keep the name Vermont State Colleges because you already have the business cards. You wouldn't have to change them. That would save a lot of money. And that's exactly what we are. We're Vermont State Colleges. Some of them might be universities. Some of them might not. And that's exactly what they are. How we got into trouble. We got into trouble because we created all these positions. Deans and assistant deans with six plus figure salaries. I remember that the president of our college was making $80,000 a year. And he has a very big legendary name and eventually became very big in the VSC as well. I'm salary and I work 60 plus hours while many VSC employees work 37 and a half hours in the summertime. How is that okay? If we're going to give market rates for salaries, we should be expecting market time for work. I actually secured the VTC.edu name back in the 90s. You guys have not secured VTSU because VSU is taken by Vermont's Virginia State University. So why have you not secured VTSU.edu if you're actually considering to your name to Vermont State University? Where's the innovation technology part of the study that was done by the marketing company? That's not in the name. I hear Vermont State University. I don't hear innovation or technology anywhere in that name. And they identified that as a very strong part of the brand. I propose to make a gentle transition that preserves the identity of each individual college so that we have a certain amount of time to make transition and create the identity of Vermont State. Hopefully college or university that allows us to be able to associate those things, especially with the web footprints that we create on a daily basis. And also I would recommend that we drop the state if the state can't figure out how to give us funding. It was back then in 1999 as a trustee that I had to go and puppet myself in front of the legislature every time. 30 seconds, please. What's that? 30 seconds, please. Okay. Anyway, lastly I'd just say we had a message on campus in Vermont Technical College that was very important and was called Students First. That's what our mission should still be. Thank you. Thank you, Bill. All right, next up we have Steve. We will ask Steve Cormier. We'll ask you to unmute. And on deck we have Rich Clark. I'm only going to ask this question because I like everybody said going up and down. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Yeah, there you go. All right. My name is Steve Cormier. I'm a London State College grad class of 1982 and a nine year member of the Alumni Council. I'm part of this tonight for a couple of reasons. First of all to show my support to the new name. I think Vermont State University is the correct name. But as others have said, I think that each individual campus needs to be a part of that. So Vermont State University at Linden, Randolph at Johnson, and I hope that the board will do that when you move forward on this new name. Being a part of NVU for many years, including my kids going to Linden and NVU, the Linden and Johnson community have been through this. The students, the faculty, the alumni, the community, the name change, the unification. And during that time, there was a lot of good things that happened and some things that I think we learned we should have probably done differently. The point I want to talk about tonight is the marketing of these campuses. They're all unique. They're all different. They're all special. They all have different brands. And I really feel that's where we failed as NVU. We did not market those different campuses. Do North did nothing to market those campuses. Do North to me was a slogan that was a wasted slogan. Personally, I think you should drop it now. That's how bad I think it is. So as you move forward here, I hope that you put money aside and market these campuses as they are. I just want to talk about a program at Linden that I thought suffered greatly after NVU came on board. And that is the electronic journalism program. Before it was NVU, that program won many awards, nationally recognized program, top five program many years, lots of Emmys and then NVU came along and the message got homogenized. And that program has suffered greatly with many less students, many less faculty, an award winning program. And I'm sure there are programs like that on every campus. So I really believe if you do not do that moving forward, because marketing brings students, if the students don't come, we're going to be in the same situation in five years. We need to find ways to bring students back to these campuses and you need to market in different cities in the Northeast to try to get somebody's Linden during my time. And afterwards, there were a lot of kids who came up from New York, New Jersey, because we were out in front of it. So I hope you will do that as well. And I understand that some people are not happy. As we move forward, we're in this together. We all need to work together. I hope that we can do that. And I hope that we get it right this time. Thank you. Thank you very much, Steve. Okay, Rich Clark, we will ask you to mute and Lisa Pleban, you are on deck. I'm asking because I really don't know. Can you hear me? We can hear you. Okay, thank you. My name is Rich Clark. I'm a professor at Castleton University. And what I'm asking you today is that you press the pause button. Just, I think we're moving way too fast with changes that may be irreversible and may ruin the university that I've come to love. We are rushing into critical surgery without doing all the necessary tests, in my opinion. The chancellor told the Castleton community last Friday that the purpose of all of this is to save the BSC institutions. I appreciate that. And there are endemic problems with the system, mostly as a result of underfunding by the legislature for years. Our funding has been far shy of the whole or substantial level promised in Title 16, Chapter 72 of the Vermont State Statutes. But here are my major concerns as the merger moves forward. Number one, the entire merger should be guided by a shared vision and mission statement. But the work on that is not yet completed. Still, we pushed forward in the summer with this optimization of programs based on criteria that had no foundational mission behind them. It was like driving for hundreds of miles before deciding on our destination. It just does not make sense. David Mooc made this point, I think well. Number two, the process was said to be student centered. And yet students have only recently been brought into the process. It's all about the students or it should be. But it's like manufacturing a warehouse of products before testing the market. And as students are brought into the process, I strongly feel that they should be monetarily compensated for their time. Just as you pay other consultants, our students are here to be students. We work for them. Number three, the one program that touches every student in the system, Gen Ed, has not even been assessed as far as I can tell. I was part of a committee that spent six years on Gen Ed at reform at Castleton. And we are just now launching our new program this semester. Experts at the American Association of Colleges and Universities have commended us for our work. We need time to collect data and do rigorous assessment. And when this is complete, we will know if our program meets our projected outcomes or not. But this takes time and the merger puts it all at risk. Number four, curricula cannot be revised by a minority of the faculty in a two-month timeframe as we attempted this summer. And for the good of our students, we need to get this right. Number five, I see no reason for us to change the names of our new institutions. Netshi doesn't care. Why do you? Why does the chancellor's office care? And can we please request a refund for the valuable dollars used on one of the most god-awful surveys constructed? It appears that VisionPoint subcontracted this out, so perhaps they can request the refund on our behalf. The brand perception study with Bogus- 30 seconds, please, Rich. Thank you. That having a large number of responses makes a survey good. Castleton University is a proven successful name. I don't know why we're going to put that at risk. I thank you for your time. I know this is difficult. I'm just asking you, let's do the research first. Press the pause button. Let's get this right. Thank you. Thank you, Rich. Lisa, we are going to ask you to unmute. And Salil Devin-Borthwick, you are on deck. I'm sorry. You can hear me, right? Yes, we can. All right. I fell left out. I didn't ask that question. Where's the rest of the board? Do I not see them on my screen? Are they in attendance? Or is everybody here? Because I see nine people on my screen. Is everybody here? Can somebody give me an indication maybe in the chat room? Because, okay, beautiful. Because this is really important. And everybody is engaged in this process here that's on this call. And I worry about the people that are not here. I worry about decisions that are made for other people when you're not at the table. I'll say that again. Beware of people who make decisions for you when you're not at the table. This decision making process, the faculty, students, alumni, we say they've been involved, but as we dig deeper, we're finding out people are just getting to the tip of this iceberg. I would like to know what the benefit to cost is for this name change. Show me the numbers. What's the benefit? Give me the dollars because if we're talking about saving the system, we have no proof of that. That money has not been distributed well to begin with. We're sending $280,000 out of state to a firm that you just heard from Rich Clark. He's in charge of the polling institute Vermont. VPR can trust this guy. Maybe you guys should listen to him as well. The NVU unification, that was another $2 million. We're just wasting this money. Let's put this pause on and let's get sensible here and say what's the cost? What's the benefit? If renaming something, Castleton, Vermont State University, that works great, but let's see the proof. This has been hard for everybody. I appreciate the job you have to do. We're doing our jobs on our campuses as well. And we demand transparency. Let's see some real figures. And there's my warning button. I had a time run. Let's see some real figures. Help us understand that this might actually work. Thanks for your time. Those who are here, appreciate it. Thank you, Lisa. I just wanted people to know, Shirley Jefferson, one of our trustees, is on. She's having some tech problems, but in case anyone can't see her, she is here. So we are moving to Celil Devon-Borthwick. We'll ask you to unmute. And we have Gabe Simpson on deck. Hey, everyone. I just want to say that there is a whole lot of misinformation being thrown around about this. There are still rumors of campus closure. And I just really hope that the Chancellor's office can make a better effort to keep our staff, our students, and our faculty informed through this process, because as uninformed as we are, I know many people who do not feel comfortable speaking out because they just do not understand the situation well enough to make those comments that they feel they should be able to. And I think there are a lot of problems with the communication efforts that are currently underway. And I really would like to see work done in that regard so that this process can have involvement of the people who are actually comprising these universities and these institutions. Thank you. Thank you, Celil. Okay, Gabe Simpson. We're going to ask you to unmute. And Senator Cheryl Hooker, you are on deck. Okay. I actually wrote a speech for tonight, so I'll be reading from that. I think that the name change of Northern Vermont University to Vermont State University is not the answer to the school's problems. Unlike Johnson State College that was here prior, who had a reputation for being a better school, it is widely known that the school discriminates and financially exploits its students. There is no evidence that changing the name of a school increases funding. Vermont State Law 13 VSA 1380 states that no one who is vulnerable in NVU's case, its homeless students shall be exploited for wrongful profits. Civil Financial Exploitation 10 GCA 21102 is a federal law that says you cannot financially exploit disabled students, telling autistic students that they have to pay you $2,800 by a date a week away is violating this law. The Vermont State Law 33 VSA 9602 says the following, any conduct committed with an intent or reckless disregard that such conduct is likely to cause unnecessary harm, unnecessary pain or unnecessary suffering to a vulnerable adult. The other part of this law, the school and the college board is breaking is, and I quote, intentionally subjecting a vulnerable adult to behavior which should reasonably be expected to result in intimidation, fear, humiliation, degradation, agitation, disorientation, or other forms of serious emotional distress. Mental abuse is a crime in the state of Vermont. That is why I have taken the liberty of reporting the college board and school to the state. I also have opened a lawsuit. The college board and the school do not care. You are only concerned about yourselves and your own image. I once attended a school called Green Mountain College. The college valued its students and I had a proper education and materials and books included in my school. I lived on campus and although I was homeless, I was safe. So no, I do not agree with the name change because I don't think it solves the problems that you have. I think the best option you would have is to fire the staff that are discriminating your students and start over from scratch. Okay. Thanks, Gabe. We will now unmute Senator Hooker and we have Keith Chamberlain on deck. Thank you. Thank you all for the opportunity to speak. You've heard a lot of emotional testimony for a long time, I might add, from a lot of different people, whether they're alumni from the various colleges or students who are concerned about the future. I share that concern about the stability of our Vermont State College system. The name change to Vermont State University isn't objectionable. What I hope that you'll do is to put the names of the campus first. Castleton University, a member of the Vermont State College University system. Northern University, a member of the Vermont State College University system. Vermont Technical College, a member of the Vermont State College University system. The previous speaker said that a name change isn't going to solve the problems. We all know that. The branding of Vermont that I've heard the Chancellor and others speak about I think is a given. Once students look, once parents and students look to Vermont for on their higher education, they should be able to choose the campuses based on whether they are looking for journalism courses, nursing courses, athletics, whatever the case is. But to put the names of this colleges first, I think would certainly feel better to the alumni, better to the areas in which the campuses are situated. And I feel that it would be more genuine. Someone mentioned the marketing group that compared our colleges to colleges that have 20,000 students. We're a small state. These are small colleges to maintain their identity, I think is important. So I'm supporting those alumni, those faculty members, those students who are looking to keep the names of our campuses front and center as we change to what is necessary, this transition to the Vermont State University system. Thank you. Thank you for your work. I know you have a lot more work ahead of you. There's been some suggestion about slowing down the process, maybe not a bad idea, looking at mission and vision to move to this necessary step, but with the greatest care that you can. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, Senator Hooker. Okay, Keith Chamberlain, we will unmute you and Senator Collamore, you are on deck. Hi, can everyone hear me? Yes, we can. Great, thank you. I'm a 1977 graduate of Linden State and have worked in marketing and branding for, well, ever since I graduated and spent quite a few years in my career recruiting students from Linden State College. So I take particular interest in this conversation. I'm here only to speak really about the merits of the name and the brand and not the merits of the merger or any other issues at play here. I do think it's kind of a slam dunk name. I think it makes infinite sense when I first heard about the merger, it was flashed in my mind as a logical solution to this, a solution a lot of other states have found. I grew up in New York State where we have the SUNY system, but everyone identifies by the campus. People don't identify by system, they identify by campus. And I don't see any reason why that would change with this name. I understand why folks from Castleton are wounded by these sorts of moves. Certainly we understand it better than most, but a lot of this just comes down to how the professionals end up handling the specifics of the branding and how it's presented. So for instance, I think in all instances, the mention of Vermont State University should be quite minimal and the name of the campus should be maximal. That that should really be the first thing you see. That there's a common signature for the brand of the collet of the system, but really what you identify with is Lyndon Johnson and Castleton. So in the case of Castleton, if you look at this from a visual standpoint, what you see at their site is the word Castleton, this very small tagline. You just basically are swapping it with different wording. So from the standpoint of recruiting students and how they perceive the brand, it doesn't change that much and it will actually give Lyndon and Johnson a chance to reclaim their brands, which may still have some value in the marketplace. So I kind of applaud the decision. I think a lot of devils in the details here in terms of how it's phased in, but I think this could be actually very successful. The other thing I just want to say is please be disciplined about program duplication. I've seen the damage of that for so many years. In the generations, literally, I've been associated with Lyndon in the system. And hopefully this merger will will add some discipline and some focus and some meaning to that. And I thank you very much for your time. Thank you very much, Keith. Okay, Senator Calamore, we will unmute you and Ari Preston, you are on deck. Thank you very much. It's nice to see so many familiar voices. We'll see faces and hear voices that are very familiar. And I want to thank the board for taking time to listen tonight. I attended the Town Hall meeting at Cassington University last week along with Senator Hooker. I think I'd say to say we were both very impressed with the students and what they had to say that day. There are 20 plus legislators in the Rutland County delegation. I have not surveyed all of them, but I feel confident when I say the great majority of them are strongly opposed to the name change as it has been proposed. And the previous two speakers, I think, made very good points about allowing the name of the institution to precede any reference to the Vermont State University name. I'd also like to indicate from what I read the opposition of State Senator Anthony Polina. He's from Washington County and is an alumnus of Johnson State College. And also, again, as proposed, does not favor the name change. I spent an hour on the radio station in town here today. We took phone calls from the Rutland County residents and every call we received opposed the change as well. And I know you all have received a letter from over 1,300 Cassington University alumni and also a letter from former Cassington University President Dave Waugh with what I think are very thoughtful reasons for not changing the name of the three institutions as it's been proposed. Or I would think that, again, the suggestion of Dean Andre Kleck made a lot of sense earlier. And I'm sure you will take great care in thinking about that. And I thank you for your time. Thank you, Senator Calamore. Okay, Ari Preston, we're going to unmute you and Beth Foy, you are on deck. Okay, can you hear me? Yes, we can. So my name is Ari Preston. I am an assistant professor in the Atmospheric Sciences Department at NVU-Linden. And we all know that changing names is not easy. It takes hard work. And there may be initial rebranding issues. However, for the long term health of Vermont's public colleges, I am in favor of the new Vermont State University institution. It is especially important that the new institution includes Vermont in its name. Many of our Atmospheric Science and Climate Change students are out of state. And they come here specifically because of Vermont's appeal. Overall, this new institution should be a unifying moment for Vermont's public colleges and hopefully not a divisive one. All of our state colleges have very strong academic programs, and each one plays a critical role for higher education in the state. Rebranding does not mean each campus will lose its identity. For this new institution to work, it is especially imperative that each campus keeps its uniqueness in place. As an example, we should look to our neighboring state to the west. The SUNY system of New York has many strong Atmospheric Science departments, but each one remains distinct from one another, just like I hope our campuses will be within the Vermont State University system. The Linden campus has already gone through one merger, and this did not take away from our students' love of their campus. The Linden brand has a strong reputation for many departments on our campus, including the Atmospheric Sciences. And although this proposal means another merger, the essence of the Linden brand will live on as will the brands of other departments at other campuses. Thank you for your time. Thank you, Ari. Okay. Beth Foy, we're going to ask you to unmute and Tyrone Shaw, you are on deck. Hi, my name is Beth Foy. I'm a Johnson resident. I'm also a Johnson Select Board member speaking for myself, not the board. And I want to just thank you for the opportunity to speak. I appreciate the time and effort that's gone into all you've had to consider over the past two year plus. I do appreciate the thoughtfulness that went into the name selection. I support the Vermont State University name. I agree with many, many speakers. Identity matters. All of our Vermont State campuses matter. Vermont State University at Castleton, Johnson, Linden, Vermont Tech can be a new identity and be the identity that has always existed, where they're both individually and collectively stronger. We need our campuses. I think we all can agree with that. And we can have a great Vermont State University system. Our attitudes around this also matter. This can work. This name change can work. I have many thoughts about many other topics around all of this, but focus specifically on the name. There's this old adage, whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're right. And I think we can. And I really hope that others join that attitude that Vermont State University can work. And I want to just thank Keith Chamberlain because his contributions about branding and marketing, I think are important when it comes to identity. Talking about the campus location as a prominent part of the marketing and branding can make Vermont State University strong and equally align the identity of those campuses with what everyone is longing to keep, it seems. So thank you for the opportunity. I appreciate it. Thank you, Beth. Tyrone Shaw, we're going to unmute you. And Courtney Cramer, you are on deck. Good evening, everybody. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Great. My name is Tyrone Shaw. I'm a professor of writing and literature at NVU Johnson. One year ago, the labor unions of the Vermont State College's system endorsed a vision for radical transformation of the Vermont State College's system, titled, A Design for a Unified Public Access Higher Education System. Some of that proposal is reflected in the reality we now face, including the proposed name Vermont State University. That name reflects two overriding attributes meaningful, I would hope, to all stakeholders in this endeavor. As Sophie noted, abundant market research is established that the Vermont brand is a powerful attractant, as is the word Vermont. The word State, proudly and prominently integral to this new name, reflects and honors the crucial public mission entrusted to this board, to the chancellor's office, and to all of us in this besieged system, working on behalf of a better future for all Vermonters. With a nod to Shakespeare's Juliette, a rose by any other name would smell as sweet comes to mind. Not remotely sweet, however, are statements from some of NVU's colleagues to the South. At the onset of Northern Vermont University, Lyndon and Johnson State College's historical rivals went through a period of grief and anger at the prospect of losing their individual identities, but never sunk to the level of calumny we have seen of late, by some directed towards NVU particularly. And that is very unfortunate, especially, since the name Vermont State University speaks loudly of meaningful access, unity, transformation, and yes, hope for better times. Consequently, I wholeheartedly support this proposed name, and I hope we can temper the dialogue that is roiling, especially among social media at this moment. It will do none of us any good. Thank you very much. Thank you, Tyrone. Courtney, we're going to unmute you, and Gabriel Wilkinson, you're on deck. Go ahead and unmute yourself, Courtney. If you should see the message, maybe Courtney, a stepped away, we can come back to Courtney. Gabriel Wilkinson, we will ask you to unmute. Hi, my name is Gabriel Wilkinson. I am the Student Council President at VTC. I've been asking many of the students around the campus, and I've had some concerns that the name sounds too similar to UVM. We're worried about the confusion this could cause for prospective students trying to do research on the college. I've also seen a lot of concerns about losing our identity as a school. VTC is a different school than the rest of the other colleges. We're a technical school, and losing that part of our name ends up stripping us of who we are. In the end of the day, having the school end up existing after all this is what I care about and what most of the kids here care about. Yeah, that's it. Thank you, Gabriel. Chair Dickinson, that is the last person we have signed up to provide a comment tonight. Okay, thank you, Jen Poirier. That was very helpful. I thank all the people who signed up and participated that it's really important we get to hear from everyone that wanted to speak. At this point, we are going to go into our regular meeting. This is a little less time for this listening period that I originally thought we would need or that we originally scheduled. So if there's anyone else, please speak up now. If not, we can move into the discussion with the board. This will be for the board members to ask questions of the administration, to discuss things that they've heard, things that have been submitted to us in writing, and I really want there to be a frank and open discussion about these issues, and addressing the concerns that people have made to us. Is there someone in the board that would like to start? Okay, I'll start asking you. I'm going to ask, I'm going to ask Dylan Jambatista, who has actually attended several of our schools and is a good example of a non-traditional student. Dylan, do you have any thoughts on anything that you've heard? Thanks, Lynn, and hello everyone, and thank you to everyone who took the time to be with us tonight. I have been trying to process all the feedback we've received, certainly a lot of it here since this conversation began, but also this has been a long standing conversation over the last several years, really. Long standing conversation before I ever arrived on the board in 2017, and a conversation in fact that was present when I was a student. You know, these are considerations that I've thought a lot about. I grew up down in the Rutling County area in a little town called Wallingford, and I went to high school at the Mill River Union School District, and so many of my peers, including my brother, ended up going to Castleton either for time or to complete their studies. So it's an area I'm certainly familiar with and appreciate the feedback. At the same time, you know, I'm also someone who struggled in school, dropped out of high school, and struggled to find a career, really, in those years that followed, leading up to eventually going to the Community College of Vermont, where I attended at four campuses, including Rutland's campus, Burlington, Winooski, Montpelier, I attended online classes, and then I transferred to Northern Vermont University Johnson, which was then Johnson State College. So it's certainly a system that I've been around, and I hear the real feelings from all sides, the considerations. Unfortunately, some of the differences of opinion based upon section, which to me is a big question that I'm weighing, particularly as we review how we got here and what we've been asked to do, not only by members of the campus communities, but also by legislators, our laws, laws that recently were passed that put us on a track toward unification as a system, as a system-wide entity that would better be able to manage its future, provide for its students so that they could have access in a statewide system, which I know is very important to every member of the board, including me, and gave direction toward forming a common identity, one that would best serve students as we sought to figure out what we are in this new world. The pandemic maybe has accelerated some of that, but it's something that we've been thinking about a lot, because the state of play for post-secondary education is and has been changing, and it will continue to. But when I weigh this all in balance, I do want to share that a big part of the direction that we take is from the law, and the law says you got to go down this path. You have to find a way to make it work and achieve financial stability. I've worn a lot of hats. I've been a student. I've written letters to members of the faculty and of college leadership when I was at Johnson, in support of more funding, more programming, more things to help me as a student get what I needed. As a legislator, I introduced legislation to increase funding, and I'm no longer a legislator. So I don't wear that hat anymore, but I do wear this hat, and it's trying to weigh the best interest of the students of the campuses and of the future of the system. So please know that as I step back and look at all this, and as we take direction from the laws that are now on the books, and from where we're going to provide stability, I believe in balance achieving a unified system really will benefit all of our students and future generations of students. So thank you for your feedback, and I don't know if that's what you were looking for, Lynn, but it's certainly some of what I'm weighing, and I'm sure others have thoughts too. Thank you. That was helpful, very helpful. Financial stability piece and the work of the select committee is an important part of this. We did this because we did have to find a way to continue to be financially stable on all of our campuses with all of our schools. Is there anyone else who wants to say something? Go ahead, Sue. Sue Zeller. Hi. So I think my background in finance will say that I think the financial stability is the most important piece from my perspective, but that's not really about the finance. It's about the fact that if the entire system is not functioning as a whole, then you're not able to leverage the value of your different campuses. And I was really happy to hear from so many different areas in our public comments, both teachers, both former students, current students, community members. I think that was really very valuable for me, since I'm relatively new to the board, to hear all the discussion. I think we owe it to this institution, as the legislature has said, to make this institution work. Although I don't think, and I agree with everyone that's talked about, we don't want to lose the feelings of the individual campuses. And I think that the new name allows for that, as many people talked about that. And so I would just say that I think I've been very glad having come into this so newly that people are as interested and willing to participate and willing to make comments. So that's been very valuable for me. And I appreciate all the efforts on all of the people who spoke tonight's part. Thank you. Thank you, Sue. Anyone else? Is there anyone else who's volunteering to speak? Yeah. Can you hear? Lynn, I'll speak up. This is Sean. Go ahead, Sean. First off, I want to acknowledge the frustration, the fear, the concern that I've heard from many reading through the comments over the last several days, heard from some people today. And someone who's a Linden resident and kind of went through this a couple of years ago with the NVU rebranding, I can deeply appreciate what people are experiencing. I think I've shared with some of you, but my mother attended Linden State College as a single working mom when I was young. And I remember her experience going through the education she got there, towing two kids behind her when she attended some classes, waiting on the quad for her when she had to meet with the professor. And I deeply, deeply understand just how important each of these colleges are to our communities and to the entire state of Vermont. I also understand just how the sense of urgency we have around moving forward with the transformation that we've been charged to carry out here. And I think it's important and maybe we need to do a better education amongst all our stakeholders of just how dire the situation has been and why it's so important for us to move in this direction as we make a unified university system. That said, I feel really good about the name that our consultants have suggested and feel like we can do this, and it will ultimately be a strong system. Because I watched Linden and Johnson go through that merger, go through rebranding, and come out as a strong institution. So we can learn from that. We can learn from the mistakes that were made as part of that process and ultimately be successful on the other end. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, Lynn, can you hear me? Sure. Shirley, you can go next and then we'll go to David. Okay. Well, first I just want to say thank you to Sophie. I mean, you've been working so hard, you and your staff, you know, I'm really crying because I don't know how y'all have done it. You know, I'm over at my law school and now I'm on this board. I got a full-time job. We're doing the same thing that you're doing here. I have four universities that I have to work with, not just these three. I got another one. I got a law school. I really don't care what the name is. What I care about is that we keep providing the community colleges for the underrepresented people here in Vermont. These community colleges provide education to first and their families, just like you said, Sean, single parents, older students, you know, all of that. That is the core of something that I hold close to my heart. That's why I said a name doesn't matter. But what matters to me is that we continue to work hard and make these colleges and make this one university to really work and that we won't have to go through this again when I say we won't be here, but that we make it sustainable, that we really put a great foundation down, you know, because a lot of hard work, you know, has gone into this. And I've been reading, you know, like I said, I've been, I said, Lord, did I make a mistake by getting on this board because this is a lot of work? I said it, I'm honest. And I'm like, I already got it. You know, it's like another full-time job. And then I read the comments, you know, from the young people, the community, you know, how they care so much about their universities. And I think that they care so much about it that they can't really see that we're saving them and that they won't lose their identity. And that's the sad part of it. And I just want to just express, you know, my appreciation, you know, to everyone for keeping these community, keeping these community colleges together. And I'll do what I do the best that I can, you know, and I thank you all for, you know, working so hard and working together. And I just know that we can get through this. And thank you for letting me speak. I'm sorry, I couldn't, I was having you. I finally got in here, Lynn. You know, I had three devices and not any of them would really work. But I finally got in. So thank you. Well, thank you. David, I think you had your hand up. I did. Thank you, Lynn. Perhaps I can ask a question or a clarifying question. You know, there's been a lot of discussion from the people that were kind enough to share their thoughts with us. A lot of the conversation was around keeping individual campus identities and how that interplay with the name of Vermont State University. And I know that at some point in time, you know, we're going to be asked to make a decision. And I'm not entirely clear exactly what that decision might be. I mean, are we able to include locations? Is that not part of the consultant's recommendation? I guess I'd like to hear perhaps from Sophie on that topic to really understand what we're being asked to decide. Yeah, I think today it's really the name, the Vermont State University name. The other piece is that this is really step one. And I think when Vision Point Marketing came and spoke to the board at your last meeting, explaining that the next part with branding could be looking at those identifiers, right? So whether it's a place name, whether it's a program name, I think that particularly for Vermont Technical College, it's very important to that community to make sure that the word technical or innovation or something that captures that other theme that came through strongly from the research be captured and retained because people know, for example, for Vermont Tech, they know Vermont Technical College, Vermont State University Randolph is probably not going to mean a whole lot to people. So I think as I recall what the Vision Point Marketing was saying was that we can do a lot. Having a name like Vermont State University provides a basis from which we can then have these sub identifiers, whether it's by locations, whether it's by particular programs or again, a school or a college within the new university. So it gives that flexibility to come up with those identifiers for marketing moving forward and branding moving forward. I thank you. That helps me a great deal. I mean, there's been a pretty visceral reaction from folks with regards to identifying with a campus in one way, shape or form from, eliminating what we've come up with entirely to suggesting that we add a certain locational kind of a thing. Is it appropriate for us to give our consultants strong guidance that of what our preferences might be or is that preliminary? I think if the Board has thoughts on that, we can certainly communicate that to the consultants. I do think one of the threads that I heard in the comments was keeping the name at the front and then sort of so I just don't know how that would work. So for example, Castleton University already is a Vermont State College. It's within the Vermont State College system. I do think we want to be able to be clear about Vermont State University that's bringing together the three institutions. So I do think it's important as we move forward that that's understood. Again, I think we can still have identifiers for programs for locations. It's also again, and Sharon can maybe speak to this as well, but it would be expensive to fully brand every institution, every campus separately or every program separately. We need an umbrella brand that we can then have sub brands come from that's a coherent whole rather than a series of very different brands because I think that will be confusing in the marketplace as well. I mean, we have a chance to really build something new and creative moving forward. The other piece, people raise mission and vision. We need to have that, that as you know, Nolan Atkins and the group of folks that he's working on from across the institutions are working on that. And the plan is to have that brought to the board for your October 25th meeting, which is not that far away. So I just shared that because I know there were comments in terms of pausing until we had the vision and mission. That is the next step that's coming up right away, if that's helpful. The Sharon available to answer some of those questions right now. Absolutely. The expense of creating a master brand that begins first with the geographic location or the identifier for say technology limits our ability to be able to have economies of scale when it comes to purchasing our marketing and purchasing names and materials. It limits our ability to be able to really control how we're moving forward. That does not though prevent us from being able to have brand pillars or other activities that really allow us to be able to differentiate by a location or by functional responsibilities like technology, a technology institute, there are ways to be able to do that. But we have to also simultaneously be looking at how are we going to reduce our expenses and the structural deficit that we have with the size institution that Vermont State University will be. It's actually really the size of a small university. Our universities are really micro sized. So we're looking at about 5000 students. And so when we look at that, that's a small to low medium. And when we look at that having that master brand that would really cover each geographical existing institution would be very, very expensive and very, very challenging. We haven't run all of the numbers, but I already know how expensive it is to run our existing marketing operations. And when we look to consolidate and get economies of scale, we're able to bring down those costs or have the same costs and dramatically extend our reach. Is this something that we have to ask the consultants? I'll ask the chancellor and Sharon. Is this something we have to ask the consultants in their next phase? How do we look at schools that actually or systems or universities that actually do this? I mean, Penn State is Penn State Hazelton and Penn State Altoona. And it's got like, I don't know, 14 satellites. And SUNY has SUNY Albany and SUNY Plattsburg and SUNY New Pals. I mean, are they going to be able to go and analyze how that would be possible? Whether it's a technical program or a location? Yes, they can absolutely look at some of the things that are happening elsewhere and certainly bring that information back to you as a board. The real leveraging of the brand, particularly when you're leveraging a new brand comes from the ability to be able to really push that through the marketplace to have as many opportunities to be able to use the same brand umbrella as Sophie referred to it as possible so that you can really extend the reach of the new brand and to be able to then use that to market the specific location or set of functional programs or even an individual program if it came to that. So we have the ability to be able to look at that. Some of the institutions that you are referring to there are significantly larger than ours. Even they're smaller, Altoona, Hazelton, etc. They're significantly larger than our existing institutions. And one of the reasons why the Vermont State College is in the situation it is is because of the micro size of our institutions and having that ability to be able to pull things together and really extend our reach regionally and nationally will help us in the long run. Thank you. Megan, you want to speak? I did and I want to come back just to the question at hand because I think Dylan you framed this very well for me and grounded my thinking when you brought me back to the charge from the legislature which was to come out of our transformation with one combined entity and I think this discussion of identity and preserving what is special and important to each of these programs and locations is vitally important going forward but when I come back to that one identity question and I think about what that means for accreditation I believe that means we need one name and one entity that can then have you know satellite identities underneath it but if we're going to have one combined entity we do need one ultimate umbrella name so it would look something I think the SUNY instead of continuing on the SUNY path I would think more about we had a Virginia Tech alum on earlier Virginia Tech's Northern Virginia campus or Virginia Tech's Health Science campus that to me might be a better metaphor for how we're thinking about that okay Bill there you are yeah well let me let me say first of all I really I really genuinely appreciate each speaker tonight who took the time and it takes time to sign up to wait your turn and and to be constrained to three minutes but but a lot has been said by each each person in that three minute period and I I've been on the other side of this so we're feeling strongly about something and waiting to be heard and so I really appreciate everyone who made the effort to do that and it has it has had an impact for me I want to and I took some notes as I was listening and I want us to I want to pick up on something and I'm not going to get the name maybe right but I think it was uh Gabrielle uh toward the end Wilkinson said you know what matters to me is after after this is all said and done uh that the school exists and I think we we need to not lose sight of the fact that our goal our our mission our mission is to preserve public higher education for Vermonters it's fabulous that people are coming from other states but our mission is to preserve public higher education for Vermonters and I as I was sitting here I started to make a list and I don't know that I have it exactly right but I thought well the list of higher education uh uh colleges and universities in Vermont that are no longer here uh is it has been a growing list Green Mountain College New England Culinary Institute Marlboro College uh Vermont College merged with Norwich some years ago uh I believe st. Joseph's the provider I maybe have it wrong but I don't think they're functioning the same way they were uh Trinity College uh some people don't remember but Trinity College used to function in was a college in Burlington and we have absorbed programs from other colleges Green Mountain the the Killington program came from Green Mountain College as I remember or for and was merged into the Castleton program it's now it's now something that we brag about this part of the Castleton program that came from there uh they there's a community uh counseling community community counseling program uh at NVU which was once at Trinity College then it was at northern at New Hampshire University and is is now part of NVU so we we're not a static situation even as we think about who we are so I I appreciate the angst particularly I'll just let's just say it I appreciate I appreciate the particular angst for that many have expressed uh around the Castleton University uh preserving its identity and moving moving forward I also think that uh our mission needs to be to preserve higher education across the state of Vermont that's the legislature is we in fact have benefited by a tremendous commitment even though over the years we did not get what we needed I would say not just from the legislature but from the executive let's be clear uh but that we uh our mission needs to be to strengthen this uh a unified university come out of this where we're actually working with we're forgetting some people are forgetting we're also uh have companion community college of Vermont which is another strong part of this public higher education system that we're talking about that's going to be also a part of this system uh not as a part of the merged university uh and that when you talk about articulation agreement it's trying to make sure that everything moves flawlessly between or seamlessly between the different uh programs that we have now a lot of work is going into this now this is I don't think this is and this is not happening really fast this is actually been taking a lot of time a lot of effort and so I'm I'm prepared at this point to move us forward because I think we can also preserve the place name uh commitment and some of the other special attributes but not and not lose uh and not lose the history that we have we have a flexible history uh these are not the names we've always lived with at any one of the campuses and I think I think there's potential to move forward and I would hope that we could find a way uh collectively to come forward and move move forward with this as a new opportunity to strengthen public higher education in Vermont. Thank you Bill. Ryan there's a question about the student trustee I think you should go next. Well I think there was a question of if there's one not necessarily if there was one that uh but uh yeah uh since been called upon so yeah to answer questions there's a student trustee it's me for those who don't know me I'm Ryan Cooney I'm in the aviation or a professional pilot technology program at Vermont Tech's Williston campus um and this is my second year in this position so I've been around um since the uh first proposal to close some campuses and since then I've been working with the board uh to kind of see this transformation through it's my opinion that this transformation represents the best possibility for the system moving forward and for the future generations of Vermont students and those from around the world and those from the other states that we are very happy to have with the system as well because undoubtedly not only do the in-state students matter but so do all those others who come to us for the educations that they receive and then go back out into the workforce in the world the name's tough it is a change it is not a change that many would perhaps like and I think we've heard that tonight and I appreciate the comments that I've heard from the community members and from the students that I've heard previously and from the team that I work with but I do I support this name I think it's a good strong name moving forward it puts us on level footing with what other states have already done and have been doing prior to this and again I think it's important to note that this does open up possibilities of iterations moving forward we can still talk about the technical aspects that this college that this university will provide the athletics that this university will provide and that the locations will still be there we are still going to maintain the presence in each of the locations we currently are and I'm proud of that and I think again this name really does promise some great things for the future that we can all be proud of while still ensuring that the legacy in the history is thought of and remembered and talked about for generations to come thank you uh Karen Luno do you have thoughts please um just a few um I agree I agree with much of what's been said by fellow trustees and unless anyone think I'm going to vote for this simply because I'm going to fall asleep shortly if we don't move along with the meeting I want to erase that thought I've been involved in in boards of public education in the state of Vermont for 35 years continuously minus six months my passion is for public education um and I believe that we cannot sustain a democracy in our way of life without high quality public education and I've been privileged and honored to serve all the way through kindergarten through higher education and workforce development as a focus and a concern I've had consistently is the fragmentation of resources and focus in a small state and you know you never get to address in Vermont the whole piece so you have to be wherever you are and do the best you can with the piece that you're able to address and I understand the passion of my good friends at Casselton and they're good people and they've worked hard and they've got a wonderful product and a wonderful campus and with all my heart and soul I don't believe that their hard work is going to be diminished and that that product is going to be diminished and I think we're going to be able to acknowledge not only that location but other locations and programs in short term in the future and I think for now the issue at hand is is to this very next step with this name that's a common sense name and I think I'm the longest serving trustee and I want to assure everyone um I've heard that name bandied about going back to Jim Douglas who put together a blue ribbon panel and probably it was bandied about even before that that that would be a good name and then it had popped up again and again and again um so I think it's a solid name I think it makes sense and I don't think there's any chance it's going to be confused with the University of Vermont anymore than you confuse uh the University of Pennsylvania with Pennsylvania State um I I think this is a this is a productive thing for us to do and I think we need to be steadfast in fortifying public education in an affordable manner for the people of the state of Vermont so I I fully support this. Thank you um Janet and Bar Jay do you have any thoughts? Yeah um I've appreciated you know the comments that have come from everyone both those that support this and those that are concerned about it um I've been part of organizations that have had to make really difficult change and usually when you can get through that change you you do come out stronger uh you typically not changing uh is the thing that'll probably hurt us the most um and while this name change may or may not seem like um an important part of the process uh or how pivotal it is it to me it's very foundational decision we have to make so that we can continue to drive forward both on um you know all the transformation work that's gone on that I know a number of people you know don't know the details of but how it affects our financials to quite honestly the new opportunities we're seeing with programs being joined together and strengthened um I actually think we're creating more opportunities for students uh we're not actually you know it's pretty exciting um so I think we have to have the courage to make the decision and I think it it's the pivot we need to make the change we need to be here. Thank you um we had a trustee who was here early in the uh listening session and he had a 730 appointment meeting that he had to go to so he is not here at the moment um I share also many of the thoughts of the other trustees that have spoken I do think that there is a I think that the point that we want our institutions to survive and to continue to to function and and move on with the future of Vermont's students traditional non-traditional whatever that we need to go and make these kinds of the changes that the legislature has a has recommended to us through the solar committee that there is a commitment to provide education higher education for Vermonters I would um is anyone have any other further comments seeing none would someone like to speak go ahead Bill. Yeah I want to just reiterate that this is not the end of this process and and that I think uh I I think that uh communicating with uh the folks who we've engaged around branding and etc uh this this what we're talking about here this evening uh will help inform their their future work as well and we should expect that to be the case uh and so I don't think that we need to articulate that in any particular way but I want to just be clear that uh hi this this is I I think there's lots of possibilities here and um and this is not the final this is not the final decision that is going to need to be made. Thank you David. Yeah I want to follow Bill up uh and partly responding to some of the chats um there was a question about whether the board could fight for more funding um from the executive and the legislature and that that's a nod to you Bill by the way um and the answer is the board and the chancellor currently the past chancellor and past chancellors before them have been asking for more monetary support for the vsc system for years and years and years uh I'm a 1985 graduate of Johnson state college and I'm told that at that time uh the the the Vermont state government was providing about 50 percent of our annual budget and our tuitions would make up the difference in 2019 if I'm correct the number was about 16 or 17 percent consequently we were essentially when I joined the board in 2018 and I'm a finance guy and I looked at the numbers and I was pretty horrified from the very beginning really wondered what I'd gotten myself into but there were two results of the underfunding number one uh we have become unaffordable for our students in Vermont and number two our financial viability was uh in deep trouble and um really what saved the system is the folks who care the most about it which is the citizens of Vermont the citizens of Vermont rose up and made a very clear message to the state government which is we want to keep our colleges and that was how we got funding plus a little extra federal money that came to us as a result of the pandemic um interesting timing that but so what I'm worried about is that we we make it some decisions we have a lot of hard work ahead but what I'm really worried about is that the roar dulls and all of a sudden we're on to the next thing and the legislature is on to the next thing and so is the executive arm of government and we're no longer a priority and if we don't pull off this transformation during a fairly short window especially when measured in academia uh time frames um you know we really need that's one of the reasons we're moving with purpose and and rapidly because we have to so I'm in support of this change I do feel strongly that the branding aspect should keep a campus-based identifier in some way shape or form but I don't think that that's what we're being asked to decide tonight if we are going to make a decision tonight thank you David I see that Jim Maslin has returned is there anything you'd like to say about this Jim um sorry I dropped off my computer ran out of power and I had to figure out a way to get back and it first ended up in the wrong you know as a as a guest you know kind of stuck it anyway thank you Jen for putting me back on um I've listened to nearly everything except when I dropped off for a little while I'm fully supportive of the change um all the good points I think have been made could be reiterated but but um as David just said we need to move forward it's we don't have time to total our thumbs and that's just all there is to it thank you Dylan yeah just uh you know through the course of the conversation it's been good to hear perspective from the other trustees as well but also everyone else we heard from but I do just one piece that I want to share it's an observation might be a bit of an anecdote but you know I I reflect on my time as a student of the system and you know when I graduated from Johnson State College which is what it was in 2013 and several years later it became northern Vermont University um you know that change happened and it was something that I had to reflect on as an alum and it's something that I continued to even as I go back to the campus and I did recently have the opportunity to go up because uh on alumni weekend they held a commencement ceremony for the students of 2020 in 2021 who were unable to walk because of COVID and uh I went up and I had the good fortune to speak to that those graduating classes uh at that commencement ceremony as an alum and it was really a moving experience for a number of reasons particularly as I you know soon my term will end on this board and so as I reflect on that and that part of public service it there were a lot of thoughts and talking with some of the students and folks at the campus I was just reflecting on that but I do want to share that when I went back to northern Vermont University I spoke about that place that community that college on the hill uh that I went to and its significance for me and I talked about my experience in Johnson and invited those students to join me in that as they reflected as they walked late for their degrees but nevertheless their commencement and this is something that I really want to share again because I do support um this proposal and I will be voting yes for it and I do that with the knowledge that the students who go to school at Johnson will continue to identify with it that way and that this board will work to ensure that the process as it moves forward will incorporate some version of that identity throughout it but we also need to act in a manner that best unifies the system that carries out the intentions that have been set forth in law that position our institutions the caring professors and staff who work there and all of the students now and into the future who will utilize them for success and that is our goal as a board and it's what I'm prepared to do and so I just I hope that that helps provide some context that your voices have been heard they will be part of this process moving forward and to David's point I completely agree please continue reaching out make your voices heard and let's ensure that this future of public higher education is strong for all of us so I just share that and thank you for your time tonight to everyone who is stuck with us it looks like most of you are still there thank you Dylan is there anyone else I just wanted to follow up quickly I think it was trustee Silverman that mentioned in terms of the vision point marketing receiving sort of the information from tonight and I did want to just say they are they are listening they are paying attention they will be getting the comments and for other people who are interested in the public comments we receive we will be posting those so might be tomorrow but we will be getting the public comments up so everyone can take a look at those so I would like to call for a motion to approve the adoption of the recommended name of Vermont State University for the new institution do I see a motion Dylan has moved that do I need a second Karen Uno a second did it okay any further discussion or comments or questions seeing none all those who approve the motion to approve the adoption of the recommended name Vermont State University for the new institution please indicate by saying aye any opposed thank you very much I just want to thank all of those people who have contributed to tonight's meeting the people who are from the campuses and the communities and the students I also would like to thank the trustees for all the work that they have done and the Chancellor's office and other administrators the presidents who spent an enormous amount of time trying to help work this this process through so we can have everyone survive and serve the students in the the state of Vermont um any other any other um well is there a motion to adjourn Karen Luna moves to adjourn Megan do you want to second that I'll second it thank you um any discussion on that oh yeah Lynn go ahead David um Sophie could you post uh somewhere on our VSC website how people might um if people have an interest in serving on the board of trustee how they might make that happen sure I'm not sure what you're asking me well I mean they're you know we by law there are certain uh ways to become a trustee first you start by expressing interest but you know the governor gets to pick some some are legislative and it probably wouldn't be a bad idea for folks that are here or the general public to understand how they could throw their hat in the ring if they are interested in serving yeah yeah we can certainly do that yeah I mean we said that we know there's a process particularly for the governor and then legislative trustees um get voted by the legislature but beyond that I don't know all the ins and outs of it but we can certainly post um post that um yep you're right there's different avenues because you you all you all are appointed or elected in different ways so we can share that thank you okay thank you any other comments seeing none seeing none um well seeing that I'd like to um moved uh ask for a vote on the motion to adjourn all those in favor please indicate by saying aye aye thank you thank you very much for everyone's attention and time tonight we will see you soon