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We
focus on the first year because national statistics show too many new students
are stopping out. From freshman to sophomore year, the average retention rate
for institutions such as ours is only 68 percent. UW-Green Bay is doing better.
Heading into last fall, we set a “stretch” goal of 74 percent, and hit
it. Looking at preliminary numbers for this fall, we are at 84 percent. The current job market and our capacity to attract increasingly high-ability students are factors in this astonishing increase. The driving force, however, has to be our redoubled efforts to improve the new-student experience, make freshmen feel welcome, and get them connected. While the aim is enabling students to set and then achieve ambitious academic goals, they must pursue greater goals, too. All this week, talking with newly arrived freshmen, I sensed a refreshing awareness of the life-changing potential of higher education…for themselves, and for others. That bodes well for our future. Here’s why. Those of you who heard my remarks on Tuesday at the Faculty-Staff Convocation know the customary state-of-the-university optimism was tempered by sobering reality. Wisconsin’s budget woes have hit home. My status report noted that we enter Fall Semester 2003 without: • 16 FTE positions • the level of services we’d like, or as many course sections • raises for hardworking and dedicated colleagues • $2.4 million in overall state support and another $1 million that will be taken from auxiliary accounts • students enjoying tuition as low as it used to be. The UW System took its biggest hit ever—$250 million in state support, lost, over two years—and the cut was disproportionate, far larger than that received by any other agency. For the UW, gradual erosion in state support has become a cave-in. How did it happen? In my view, one of the reasons is higher education is just not an effective political force right now. In speaking one-on-one with many, many legislators and with the Governor, I am impressed with the sincerity of their support for the concept of public higher education. They recognize our economic importance, they feel our pain. But, the reality is that they would have felt more political pain if these deepest cuts had been directed elsewhere. How did we arrive at this point? I addressed the issue at some length in my convocation remarks (archived at www.uwgb.edu/chancellor/index.htm.) Basically, there has been a diminution of society’s very concept of the “common good”…at least as reflected in politics and our public debate. Higher education, regarded in today’s United States as largely a private benefit and a private good, is an example. It should be no surprise that year after year, tuitions rise as state funding holds steady or decreases. aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaTOP OF NEXT COLUMN |
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The
way higher education is marketed shares the blame. While UW-Green Bay’s efforts
have been relatively balanced in this regard, the overall national trend has been
to highlight monetary gain and that extra million dollars that, over the course
of a lifetime, a college graduate will earn. Less often stressed is what a college
graduate, compared to a high school graduate, will contribute to the vibrancy
of society, to the “common good.” Let’s return, now, to those UW-Green Bay freshmen. This year’s newcomers are the first to enroll with the theme “Connecting learning to life” in place across campus. Implicit in their evolving understanding of what this means will be an appreciation that involvement and engagement are outward-looking activities. I am confident in their ability to “connect.” Those I talked with appear open to that spirit of deeper purpose and civic-mindedness that already characterizes our better students. All of UW-Green Bay is about to reach a better understanding of what the “public good” is in a UWGB baccalaureate education. We must agree on how, through the particular education we offer, each student we graduate makes the society a better place. What’s more, we must aggressively reclaim a position of public leadership not for ourselves per se, but for the role of knowledge, wisdom, and critical thinking in public discourse and in public decision making. Society loses if the “public” is disconnected from public higher education. The institution would survive, but it would likely be at the expense of serving increasingly diverse populations, of maintaining that wonderfully American social compact that says all citizens have a fair chance at the path to brighter futures…and just the abiding idea that education elevates and enobles all of society. I believe UW-Green Bay, as the “Connecting” university, is uniquely positioned to champion the purposes of our proudly public institutions. "Chancellor’s FYI” is part calendar, part news roundup, part first-person letter from me to you…and all about promoting two-way dialog on the future of UW-Green Bay. As always, call, visit or e-mail me at ShepardB@uwgb.edu. I look forward to hearing from you, and continuing the conversation. Have a great year. Sincerely, Bruce  |
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