On a fine autumn evening in 1930, homecoming festivities at St. Cloud State Teachers College kicked off with the dedication of Eastman Hall as a new physical education center and hub of campus life and athletics for the school’s 883 students.
This fall we open a fully reimagined, renovated and repurposed Eastman Hall, a state-of-the-art health, wellness and learning facility to serve our 21st century students’ academic, mental and physical well-being.
In addition to professional health and wellness student services delivered via the Center for Health and Wellness Innovation, Eastman’s redesigned academic spaces provide students with opportunities for clinical experiences, job shadowing, research, internships and practicum experiences.
And just as Eastman evolved along with the times, St. Cloud State University continues to anticipate and respond to our rapidly changing world with that same vision and commitment to students’ needs.
I appreciate that my first year as president of St. Cloud State coincided with our sesquicentennial year, a celebration of our 150-year legacy of resilience and progress. Our history tells a story of continuous responding and adapting to the consequential changes that unfolded around us with each passing decade.
We have responded to changes brought on by World War I and the Great Depression.
Some of our readers will remember the post-World War II influx of returning veterans when enrollment reached a new high. We responded by offering new degrees to help this new mix of students prepare for careers in science, business and other disciplines.
And in 1957, St. Cloud State Teachers College officially became St. Cloud State College.
The dot-com bust in the 1990s helped student numbers soar to more than 17,000. The buzz was about challenges on campus and in the community about accommodating this all-time high enrollment.
More recently, the Great Recession fueled a dramatic decline in higher education funding that continues today.
St. Cloud State and universities across the country are in the midst of another era of dramatic social and economic disruption. There are fewer high school graduates throughout Minnesota and the Midwest. Students have significantly more choices for higher education – 88 higher education options in Minnesota alone. And the digital revolution is leading new approaches to delivery of knowledge and information.
It is no secret universities are dealing with enrollment and funding challenges brought on by these social and economic changes.
A Forbes article last year reported on examples of sharp and continuing enrollment declines in regional universities like ours: Western Illinois down 30 percent in five years, University of Akron declined more than 25 percent and University of Central Oklahoma down 10 percent.
A recent St. Cloud Times article shared with readers our enrollment has decreased by 25 percent in that time, along with a 21 percent overall decline among Minnesota State colleges and universities.
Over the course of history we continued to meet the education and research needs of each passing era. St. Cloud State will make the changes we need to respond to the current budget challenges and enrollment ups and downs.
This year I have visited with folks around the region, going to schools, chamber and economic development groups and other places where I could listen to questions and perceptions about higher education needs and share our challenges and our new vision of being the University of Choice in Minnesota.
We have begun to make initial changes on our path to achieving that vision by expanding our outreach to a greater diversity of students seeking higher education – including 70 percent considered nontraditional – such as over-age-25, veteran of military service or mid-life career changers.
We will focus on partnership with St. Cloud Technical and Community College to better serve transfer students, and we will grow our online, graduate and professional development programs for lifelong learning, which are needed in a ever-changing job market.
Through on-campus partnerships with local businesses, faculty-led study-abroad trips and new graduate programs launched in off-campus locations, our students are learning how to be innovative problem-solvers and professional, creative citizens of the world.
As we face these challenges and new opportunities head-on, we will continue to listen, to adapt and to build a broader education ecosystem to offer more choice, more options and more innovate ways to be the University of Choice. Like Eastman Hall has been reimagined, we will be a university reimagined.
I encourage you to visit our campus and take part in the Eastman ribbon-cutting at noon Aug. 20 and to get into the spirit of St. Cloud State’s Homecoming 2019 from Sept. 25-29. There will be tours of Eastman, dedication of the new Husky Plaza and Financial Markets Lab, as well as a 5K run, reunions of alumni groups, fireworks and other celebratory events.
Go Huskies!
