 Welcome to Higher Education Matters. I'm Jeb Spaulding, Chancellor of the Vermont State College's system, and this regular program is intended to highlight the opportunities, challenges, issues in higher education. We talk about issues like affordability, interesting programs. We talk with students about their experiences. Talk about legislation that's winding its way through Washington that might affect the ability of Vermonters to go on to college. We have interesting guests, and we are very lucky today to have the President of both Johnson and Lyndon State College, Dr. Elaine Collins. Now that's rather unusual for a President to be President of two colleges at one time. How did that come to be, Elaine? Well, initially I was working at Johnson as the President of Johnson, and then the Board voted in September to unify Johnson and Lyndon State Colleges, so I'm working right now to assist the colleges to become the new Northern Vermont University, and that will happen in July of 2018. Wow, that's a big and complicated process. It is. So what was the sort of underlying reasons for wanting to unify two colleges to become Northern Vermont University? I think we're entering in a very unique time in higher education. I know I've been in the field for over 25 years, and I don't recall across my entire career any time like this. So I think the decision was spurred by the interest in taking offensive action in a time that's where we have decreasing demographic college age traditional students entering the field. And so our thought process went around the question, how can we continue to provide quality education to our students in a time that has some economic instability in a way that we can increase their student programming and opportunities and ensure that it continues into the future. Okay, that's great. So in a way it's intended to ensure that grandparents, parents, students know that the campuses in Lyndon and Johnson are going to be around for the long run, and they're going to be part of a university that's going to continually look for ways to offer students more. Absolutely. And when is this going to actually take place? The actual unification, we open our doors as Northern Vermont University in July of 2018. Okay, so you're out actually recruiting right now. People that are becoming next year will be going to Northern Vermont University. Are the names of the campuses going to disappear? Are they still going to be around? Or how's that going to work? We're going to be called Northern Vermont University, but we will have a campus in Johnson so that will always be there and we will always have a campus in Lyndon. That's excellent. So I think people right away go to one and wonder, well, what's the difference between a college and a university and why Northern Vermont University? What went into selecting the name Northern Vermont and why university is opposed to college? We celebrate the place where we work. That's a commonality that both colleges share being in Northern Vermont. So that piece was just a no brainer. We wanted somehow to foreground that we are proud of our location, that it is something that ties both campuses together and we wanted that up front. A university usually consists of multiple colleges and we felt that we met that criterion as well and in a way we could start pulling these two campuses together and then add different kinds of opportunities for students that would be more typically associated with a university. So for instance, we're thinking about a center for teaching and learning and starting that up. We are starting that process and each day we kind of think about new ways to enhance the student experience. We've been talking about signature student programs at each campus and what we would do is we actually are transporting students to the other campus to attend the signature event and then back. So it's just a way to add more excitement and different kinds of programs have twice as many available to students than they had in the past. That's very exciting. There's a lot going on there and when I was recently getting a sandwich in a shop in up in Chittenden County, the person taking my order was so excited about Northern Vermont University and assuring me that they were getting in their application next week. I hope it has come in. You know, when you think about a university sometimes I think well one of the distinguishing characteristics is they tend to offer graduate programs. Do Johnson and Lyndon now and will Northern Vermont University with campuses and Lyndon and Johnson offer master's degree programs? Absolutely. It's part of our long-standing history to offer graduate programs and we will continue to offer those graduate programs and then increase the graduate programs that we offer. That's great because I run into people that didn't know that Johnson and Lyndon have master's programs now so that's a characteristic of a university and you're also very involved in the economy of the northern part of the state as well. I know you're a member of the LaMoyle County Economic Development Corporation and they've got Makerspaces up in Lyndon and there are lots of ways. You have business departments that are working with the local businesses and offering internship opportunities for students. Is that part of what you hope to do is like be a powerful contributor to the economy of the northern part of the state? Absolutely and I think that goes back to the celebration of places Northern Vermont. I mean we are embedded in our communities. We are training our students to be active citizens in their communities to help uplift everything that we do and so we are increasing our partnerships. We are increasing our outreach and we really hope to make profound change in those communities. That's wonderful. A lot of colleges and universities are trying to sort of distinguish themselves from the PAC in some way and say okay when you think of Northern Vermont University or Johnson or Lyndon here's our unique value proposition. How do you see Johnson and Lyndon and Northern Vermont University distinguishing themselves from the PAC? I see that one unique, let me start with Johnson. Johnson is a COPLAC institution that stands for Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges. So we have gone through a rigorous process to be certified as a college now university that offers premier liberal arts education to students so that will continue. Comparably Lyndon has nationally recognized very unique and interesting professional programs that include a wide range of programs including electronic journalism, music business industry, atmospheric sciences just to name a few. So that is one way that we add unique value. A second way is that we have just passed a new general education curriculum and we're very excited about that. At its core it has... So let me ask just a clarifying question for viewers. What is a general education curriculum? Okay, typically that is the core curriculum that students engage in in the first two years. That does not mean that they cannot take, I mean they are at the same time in some cases taking major courses but it's really some of the foundation that you want all the students to take. Exactly. That's right, that's exactly right. So you're reviewing and creating a new general ed curriculum for both colleges? Exactly, so thanks to the generous funding from the Davis Educational Foundation our faculty have been working very hard in committees to conceptualize a brand new general education curriculum that will begin in fall of 2018. And at its heart it asked the question for the students, so if I were the student it would ask me to consider how can I make an impact, a great impact on my world? What can I do to make that impact? So what we've done is we're offering a variety of courses but what is new about this particular curriculum is that it will also include a first year experience course and it will also include some enrichment courses that are more interdisciplinary in some unique areas to Northern Vermont University that include social justice, that include climate change and sustainability. That's excellent. So you know, are there other places to do that or is that pretty unusual? I mean I can't think of any myself so that those are pretty strong distinguishing characteristics for Northern Vermont University. I think a first year experience would be found across many different institutions because we all recognize how important it is to start a student off with a very positive and a strong understanding of what is expected at a university level. So I mean that that is I don't think a distinguishing feature by itself but I think what is very interesting is this kind of notion of the enriched courses that we're offering that are interdisciplinary in nature and it's a way again of tying the historical interests of both of these institutions moving out into the future. Okay, well that's pretty super. Our students, you know you had mentioned it earlier but just getting back to it in terms of a benefit to students, will they have access to more educational opportunities or co-curricular opportunities or maybe potentially even athletic opportunities under a unified university with campuses in Johnson and London? Yes they will. Let me just kind of break that up into a few parts. Academically students have already taken taking joint types of courses. There was a psychology course for example that ended with a study abroad trip where students were able to go and see Bedlam Hospital and learn more about Freud and his work in Europe and so that was a real interesting joint kind of opportunity for students. We also have a business in kind of both business faculty are working together right now to teach the program so that is a joint program that will be offered to students and it will for example add for the Johnson campus the opportunity to have a degree in accounting where we didn't offer that major before. So and that's just one example. And you know for courses like that are students going to be going to have to drive back and forth or you know how are you planning to I mean that that would be a challenge for students. Yes it would. Right now in the business department the instructors are actually commuting to the different campuses. That makes a lot of sense. And then we're using telepresence classrooms to tie the classes both together so that the students have access. Okay so in terms of telepresence it's using video technology but the classes and they're probably recorded if people want to watch them later or something like that but they're live so that it's not like just purely online. Oh no. You know just sort of. No you feel like the I mean in this case in the business case the instructors right there in the room with the students okay at least on one campus and then alternating for the next campus. And so you feel like you are just in a regular classroom setting. You can ask questions the students in the other campus where the professor isn't located can also ask questions so it just feels it has the feel of a regular classroom. Yeah I really believe that over time this is a very powerful improvement in what Johnson and Linden campuses as part of Northern Vermont University can offer and you know the viewers are thinking about it you know in terms of okay I'm just going to make up round numbers of you know full and part-time faculty let's just say each Johnson and Linden if they did have a hundred each. And under the old world you had two separate colleges each with a faculty of a hundred that for the most part didn't really even know each other. Under the new paradigm you've got one institution two campuses but a faculty of 200 and over time you know it's not going to happen all at once but over time you're going to find ways where there are there are faculty that have certain expertise at one one campus and others with a different expertise on another campus and the experience for students is going to be a significantly more rich experience. Absolutely because now they have a double network of people and experts that they can work with and you know it's rare to find a student interest I mean you might have a broad interest but if you have a narrow interest in a subject and then a professor on the other campus has the same interest then we can link those those two up so I think that is a benefit and additionally I think another academic benefit is the opportunity given that now they have twice the number of courses that they can take let's say another academic benefit is it will be much harder to fall behind in terms of the timeline because they can always get into a class and classes will not be canceled as much because we have more students that are just forming the basic pool in those classes. That's excellent so I remember so within the Vermont State College's system we currently have five institutions Johnson and Lyndon are two of them becoming Northern Vermont University we also have castles and university which until a few years ago was Castle and State College and when it converted to university status I do remember some people asking the question G does becoming a university mean that a it's going to be more expensive than it otherwise would be for students or is it going to mean that I can't get into it anymore you know the expectations are higher and at least with Castle and I remember the answer to those were no you know just going to university status if anything you know if it if it if it becomes more attractive for students to come and you get more students it can either offer expenses lower than they might otherwise would have been or increased funding back into improve the student experience do you think that'll be the same in Northern Vermont University I do I very much do our intention is to continue to provide the great access that the state college system provides to students so that is our mission and we will continue to do that at an affordable cost okay and when students are you know if their parents or grandparents out there thinking gee Northern Vermont University sounds pretty good and you know maybe we ought to be thinking about recommending that to our grandchild or child or if you're a school counselor or what have you or a business person that knows people well students need to sort of figure out okay depending on what I want to do like you know liberal arts or professional programs I ought to be thinking about one campus or the other I mean I don't know if you understand what I'm saying but the people students I mean if they want to if they want to go into the atmospheric sciences program they they ought to go to the Linden campus right they might still take courses and experience lectures and travel opportunities and stuff but they would make a decision I think to go to the Linden campus right so there will be a decision made with respect to a home campus and the home campus will be driven by the program it can be driven by a sport so you asked earlier we are planning to continue to offer our Badgers and Hornet athletic opportunities so there'll be two different knack competing groups and they will both operate under NVU but for instance let's take Linden if a student is very much interested in baseball and we offer both let's say they're interested in baseball and education all right those educations offered on both campuses but baseball is only offered at Linden so the home campus becomes Linden at that point okay so what I would encourage people to do is to visit the campuses to find out what unique things are offered and then to identify the home campus where they feel most comfortable that's excellent before I forget if people visit the campuses of course Johnson and Linden each have their own websites but there is already a northern Vermont sort of portal website that gets you into it right it's no northern Vermont Vermont spelled out dot edu right northern Vermont dot edu so people can find out more access more information which is excellent and plus you have your admissions teams are out and around and you know there's work looking for every opportunity to get the word out about this absolutely our marketing ads are going out every day we can answer any questions without just calling in and would be happy to do so and I I think people will be relieved if they have a student athlete in their family to know that you know it's not like there's gonna be you know one basketball team for northern Vermont University absolutely and there's their child or grandchild or you might have to commute back and forth to get to the back basketball practices no right good to know okay so I'm curious in your own mind Dr. Collins what is the value of a liberal arts degree in today's world and I know there is and I know that you know if you look out and say look I mean you know most of the people that get to be the head of a corporation or you know elected officials or you know many if not most of them have a liberal arts background but there's also a lot of questioning out there these days when there's so much of a focus on you know if I get a college degree I want to make sure I get a job and I get paid absolutely how does liberal arts sort of fit into that desire I think the way I think about it is it's liberal arts at work it's liberal arts at work so what can I learn during a liberal arts experience that will make me an employee who can think in dynamic new ways who can critically problem solve who can collaborate with groups who can understand cultures and differences in unique ways I think that's what it's all about for our future society and so I think that a liberal arts training will provide that type of education we do have data to indicate that even perhaps if a student engages in more technical education at the beginning going into a first job they may enter at a higher rate however the liberal arts student continues to get promotions throughout and by mid-career exceeds sometimes those students who have entered with a technical background excellent yeah and it's good to keep in mind that you know many of the jobs that are going to be available 10 years from now haven't even been created today that's exactly some businesses and whole industry sectors that were leading industries in sectors 10 20 years ago don't even exist exactly so people you know need to do more than just learn very specific technical skills they need to learn how to learn and be critical thinkers and liberal arts education can really help in that regard and to be fluid and to not be afraid to change because that's the future so I had a couple more things to cover and one is big and one is relatively small but for the issue of diplomas you know if somebody has graduated you know maybe if they're graduating this coming may they're going to get a degree from one of the Lyndon or Johnson and then next year would be Northern Vermont University I assume a choice a choice okay just tell me how that diploma situation is going to work out both for the students that are there now the students that are coming in and perhaps alumni out there that went to one or the other okay so for students who are graduating this year we are still doing business as Lyndon State College and Johnson State College so that will be reflected in the diplomas that they receive for students next year who primarily came in to the university or the colleges under the old names they will have the choice they can choose to retain Lyndon State College or Johnson State College or choose Northern Vermont University after that it will be all Northern Vermont University for alums we offer the opportunity to call in for a commemorative diploma that will indicate that they have graduated from Northern Vermont University that's great I think people will be interested I remember when castleton did something similar there were a lot of alumni that were very interested in that opportunity so we're already getting calls are you really yeah that's great they have interest so listen one of the very exciting opportunities for high school students in Vermont is called early college and if you know the viewers are out there thinking about g college is expensive and it is it's it's got a great return on investment I always like to say yeah it's not just economic the people that get a college degree are going to on the whole on average have better health outcomes they're going to vote more they're going to participate in community affairs more there's a lot they're less likely to get in trouble with the law so there's a lot of values to a college education but it can cost money early college is an opportunity for high school students to combine their last year of high school and their first year of college at no tuition to the students and it's a pretty exciting program at Johnson that's been growing over the years would you tell us a little bit about the early college opportunities and how students or families ought to you know find out about what that opportunity is most of the well we we are reaching out to high schools right now to talk to students about the early college programming so we are out around Vermont State and and talking about the program that we offer uh the program itself as you mentioned provides a full first year completely free of college education so I know that I mean that would be like a 25 percent reduction in the tuition for a bachelor's that's right or 50 percent if you're going to a social degree and there are other benefits I find that students feel more socially comfortable to continue once they have succeeded in a college experience so I think that that has been a huge benefit as well I've heard that the students just feel that the opportunity to come in and take college courses and to really think through their major in ways that they may not have thought about yet in high school has been helpful as well and and homeschool students sometimes have found it very valuable as well we are recruiting from all over Vermont okay so you know when somebody does early college I mean I don't know what you you probably know what the percentages are not that it's that important but I mean they could stay at Northern Vermont University Johnson and Linden and continue on right there or they can take their first year and apply to someplace else and and transfer credits and you know actually have demonstrated some something that's pretty valuable in terms of their application to some other place do people do both are what you know roughly at what percentage stays at Johnson or Linden I do we've had anywhere up to 50 percent staying for the for the rest of their education some years down to maybe the lowest of 35 percent okay that's great you know so and and there's and there's also just briefly there's dual enrollment opportunities for high school students to take individual courses correct junior senior that they can also explore that's right at your websites I assume yes they can call in the agency of education or and their high schools and their high schools okay guidance counselors right well that's a good opportunity too I wish we had time to talk about that more I I did want to talk a little bit about the you know and I hope the viewers can see how much excitement there is at Johnson Linden and Northern Vermont University and it's a very forward thinking energetic place and one of the areas which I know that's important to you going into the future is distance learning and where does distance learning what is it and how does it fit in with the future of Northern Vermont University well distance learning provides access in ways to people in remote areas and for people who have other kinds of responsibilities so for example if they're adult learners and they have children at home and they need time to just kind of select their own kind of time for when they can study when they have time to access the lectures or whatever's happening in the classrooms distance learning provides the means for them to do that so we are looking at increasing our distance learning programs and reaching out to people with new and exciting new programs that they can consider and is that going to be a growth area for for Northern Vermont University it will it will and you know some people have asked the question I wonder what your view on it is that you know well with you know Northern Vermont University online let's say you know you might have students from anywhere in the country why is that good for Vermonters and the Vermont students at Northern Vermont University I mean why should we care about whether Northern Vermont University is offering programming to people all around the country or the world I believe in the strength of diversity I mean we were talking about earlier about what are the benefits of liberal arts education Lyndon has a very strong liberal arts program as well and so I think there's a commonality there we both extremely believe in the benefits of diverse thinking diverse diversity in terms of ethnicity and diversity in terms of just all kind of religion all kinds of orientations for example so I think it provides access to a lot of different types of people a lot of different types of thinking and it just makes us all stronger in the end that's great and it probably helps to provide resources financial resources that can improve the programming and increase financial aid for Vermonters absolutely and I think I think in the end it's it's a question of networks I mean we are growing networks that way and you know we can choose to have networks that reside solely in the state or we can expand our networks and opportunities across the nation and across the world and I just want students to have the most the most opportunities I guess that they can have well great I hate to tell you this but we've run out of time Dr Collins it's very exciting Johnson and Lyndon becoming Northern Vermont University people can either go to northernvermont.edu I'm sure you could just google Northern Vermont University and that will get you there this is one of the exciting institutions that are members of the Vermont State College's system and if you're interested in finding out more about our other system institutions castles and community colleges from Vermont or Vermont Tech I encourage you to go to www.vsc.edu and thank you very much for tuning in today and I hope you'll come and visit us at our next program