In many ways, a good year for higher ed

Sep. 30—In many ways, it's been a good year for higher education in Vigo County.

With pandemic disruptions hopefully in the rear-view mirror, colleges have seen enrollment improvements, generous grant funding and initiatives that will provide growth not only for them, but the community and region.

Among the highlights, in June, Vigo County colleges — Indiana State University, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College and Ivy Tech Community College Terre Haute — learned that they have received approval for $5 million in federally funded READI grants.

The grants, which have matching fund requirements, are as follows:

—Ivy Tech: $1 million for diversity initiatives and to renovate/expand health science facilities. It would help grow the local healthcare workforce.

—Indiana State: $1 million to renovate the Chestnut Building on the main campus for increased capacity and opportunities at ISU's Early Childhood Education Center, which would eventually relocate there. It would serve to increase early childhood education opportunities.

—Rose-Hulman: $1.5 million to relocate Rose-Hulman Ventures. The facility is currently six miles off campus. Rose-Hulman will construct a new facility for Ventures at the corner of Indiana 46 and Indiana 42, property acquired by the institute from the Hulman family.

—SMWC: $1.5 million to expand its equestrian and athletic facilities in an effort to expand West Central Indiana region tourism opportunities.

The colleges, and the thousands of students they educate, "bring so much" to the region, Karen Dyer, the Woods vice president for advancement and strategic initiatives, said in July.

"Those students help drive the economy of our community, and of course, those of us who work at the colleges are part of the local economy as well," she said. The colleges contribute to the community's growth, quality of place and tourism.

The grants were announced by the Wabash River Regional Development Authority. Funding is through the Regional Economic Acceleration and Development Initiative (READI) program, which is run by the state and uses federal COVID-19 relief funds.

But the reasons for optimism don't end there.

Indiana State University

On Sept. 16, Indiana State University launched the public phase of its Be So Bold Campaign, which seeks to raise $100 million for the university. Funds raised will support student success and scholarships, faculty excellence, experiential learning and athletics.

"It's ambitious but we're already at 60%" of the goal, Curtis said.

The campaign kickoff took place at Hulman Center. "This is the largest fundraising campaign in ISU history," said ISU President Deborah Curtis earlier this month.

"We've had tremendous success" the past three years in the quiet phase, she said. "Now, we're getting loud about it."

The goal is to conclude the campaign June 30, 2025, which is when ISU's current strategic plan concludes.

One of the main reasons Curtis said she wanted to serve as ISU's president was because "I knew we could do better in fundraising."

Andrea Angel, CEO of the ISU Foundation and vice president for University Advancement, has lead the way in successful fundraising the past few years. "It is a wonderful thing to see," Curtis said.

The university raised $21.5 million in 2021-22 and $1.3 million on Give to Blue Day, the latter setting a single-day fundraising record.

ISU points to several other accomplishments this past year.

—Its freshman class was 7% higher in fall 2022 than the prior year, which officials see as grounds for optimism after enrollment losses that occurred during the pandemic.

—ISU student Noah Malone won three medals in the Tokyo Paralympics. Malone, who is legally blind but has some peripheral vision, won silver medals in the 100 and 200 meters and a gold as part of the universal relay, a co-ed event where athletes with different disabilities compete as one team.

—It received an $800,000 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. through its initiative, Indiana Youth Programs on Campus. The grant will help ISU expand its summer camp offerings focused on science, technology, engineering, arts, and mathematics (STEAM) to elementary, middle, and high school youth and increase their access to summer programs.

—CollegeNet ranked ISU in the top 14% nationally for social mobility. Social mobility index measures the extent to which a college educates more economically disadvantaged students at lower tuition rates and graduates them into good paying jobs.

Looking to the future, ISU will ask the Legislature for $66 million to renovate the College of Technology. The project involves renovation and expansion of the Technology Annex Building, constructed in 1980.

It would modernize space for a Center for Technology Engineering & Design. The plan includes a two-story, 30,000-square-foot addition and demolition of 17,000 square feet.

Later this year, the university also will re-dedicate Dreiser Hall after an $18 million renovation.

Rose-Hulman

In talking about the past year's highlights, Rose-Hulman President Rob Coons says that at the top of his list is "successfully and safely navigating the pandemic, which has to be at the top of everyone's list."

The type of education the science and engineering institute delivers "is so critically dependent on delivering that in person, and the pandemic is one of the biggest challenges I think we've all faced in higher education in the last several few decades."

A major achievements the past year was a record freshmen class of 643 students in fall 2021. "That was the result of a couple of years re-engineering our recruitment process kind of from the bottom up. We're really pleased with results there, in terms of quality academically and diversity of class," Coons said.

This fall, Rose Hulman welcomed its third largest freshmen class of 602.

"The enrollment success, especially in these challenging times for higher education, would be at the top of our list in terms of accomplishments for this past year," he said.

In "re-engineering" its recruitment process, in 2019 the college hired Tom Bear, who came from the University of Notre Dame and had significant experience in recruitment at both public and private institutions.

It also has expanded its use of data analytics, for example, identifying communities of students that could be successful at Rose and how to actively recruit them.

In addition, the college has also "re-engineered" its marketing and communications in tandem with enrollment efforts.

Another major highlight was opening the new, $29 million academic building in fall 2021, the result of a decade of planning.

It brought some of the science programs, including chemistry and biochemistry, "into the 21st Century in terms of facilities," Coons said. The facility also added project and design space and provided a new home base for the expanding engineering design program.

Looking ahead, the college is in the middle of a strategic planning process, which has included a survey and listening sessions asking stakeholders nationwide their opinions about the future of engineering education and how Rose-Hulman should respond.

A third-party facilitator is being used and as of late August, the college had conducted about 68 hours of listening sessions.

"We're halfway through that process," Coons said.

The next phase is to develop a detailed plan for review and approval by the college board of trustees in October 2023. "We can then begin sharing the plan with the rest of the world during our sesquicentennial in 2024, our 150th anniversary."

Rose-Hulman will be rolling out its vision and plans for the next decade and beyond.

The plan will include more details about how it intends to use the Hulman farm property, which Rose-Hulman purchased in 2017.

As far as relocation of Rose Hulman Ventures to the Hulman property, the hope is to have begun construction by 2024, Coons said. "My hope is we have a little more than a shovel in the ground by that point."

The college is still securing funding for the project. In addition to the READI grant, it also plans to apply for a federal Economic Development Administration (EDA) grant.

Other funding sources would be private philanthropy and sale of the existing Rose-Hulman Ventures building.

The facility is currently in the design phase.

Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College

The college is celebrating record on-campus growth with 575 total students this fall, including 260 news students.

Two new men's sports, sprint football and volleyball, have helped drive that growth.

Total campus enrollment was about 270 students when President Dottie King first became SMWC president.

King reflects back on the college's May 2015 decision to go fully co-ed, a controversial move at the time.

The admission of men has also served to increase enrollment of women. "We're not only growing because we're getting men, we're also growing because we're getting more women," King said.

Of the 575 on-campus enrollment, about 30% are men.

Athletics has played a role in this year's numbers.

While King had initially been reluctant to add football in the early days of coeducation, she saw that sprint football would attract students who might not attend college unless they could play the sport.

Sprint football differs from ordinary football in just one way — there's a 178-pound weight limit for the athletes.

The Woods, along with five other colleges, founded the Midwest Sprint Football League, and more colleges are expected to join.

"It's exciting to see and it's also part of our mission do something good for our community and reach out to those students who might not otherwise go to college," she said.

The college also had added men's volleyball, which starts its first season this year. Potentially, local high schools might also add the sport, she said.

"Athletics has become very important to us ... nearly 50% of our students are student-athletes now," she said.

In other highlights:

—The Woods has had much success with grant funding. It received $702,775 from Lilly Endowment for an initiative designed to help colleges engage youth ages 5 to 18 in on-campus enrichment programs. The initiative, called Indiana Youth Programs on Campus, will include study abroad opportunities for some of the programs. SMWC will launch the program in June 2023 and establish a new Office of Pre-College Outreach. The goal of the grant program is to improve college-going rates in Indiana.

—The $1.5 million READI grant, aimed primarily at equine program improvements, will enable the college to host mid-level and small equine events "to bring those tourists to our community and lift up the equine industry in our area," she said. Equine is a $3 billion a year industry in Indiana "and we want west central Indiana to reap the benefits" of that industry, King said. SMWC is the only college in Indiana to offer a bachelor of science degree in equine studies.

—The Conservatory of Music is undergoing upgrades, now focusing on the auditorium. Seats have been professionally restored and the front of the stage has been restored. ADA accessibility improvements have been made. Other improvements include lighted aisles, fresh paint and LED lighting.

The college will benefit from two historic preservation grants that will be used to address restoration of the front limestone steps, which are wearing away, and to make public bathrooms near the auditorium ADA accessible.

Also, the Cook Group Foundation has agreed to do an engineering study of the auditorium's leaded dome, which has been covered over because of a broken mechanism.

A future goal is to restore the dome "and bring that to the grandeur it once was," King said. "It was magnificently designed."

The college also is hoping for an OCRA (state Office of Community and Rural Affairs) grant to address some of the building's bigger needs, including tuckpointing.

Ivy Tech

As of early September, Ivy Tech Terre Haute had reached 85% of a $12 million fundraising goal, part of a statewide community college campaign that aims to reach $285 million by the end of 2023.

The statewide campaign is called Invest IN Ivy Tech. All locally raised dollars remain within the local communities.

Priorities locally are focused on educational attainment, leading to workforce development resulting in economic growth in the Wabash Valley.

In terms of academics, Ivy Tech Terre Haute officials say they are implementing programs to prepare students for the jobs of the future.

In fall 2021, it enrolled the first students in its new Smart Manufacturing and Digital Integration associate degree program, which prepares students for emerging, high-paying careers in manufacturing, as the industry shifts to "Industry 4.0" or the fourth phase of the industrial revolution.

Graduates of the program will be a blend of maintenance technicians and IT professionals and will be able to work with automated connected devices in "smart factories.

"That really speaks to the need in our community that we are so manufacturing focused," said Lea Anne Crooks, Ivy Tech Terre Haute chancellor.

Those trained in the new program will not only be working on equipment, but also on the data analytics that is driving the machinery, she said.

Ivy Tech is able to use a federal Department of Labor grant to work with industry in developing apprenticeship programs so that employees can pursue the SMDI program.

Last fall, Ivy Tech also launched a new academic program, an associate degree in Cloud technologies, to help close Indiana's skills gap in Cloud computing.

Cloud technology graduates will be qualified for careers as system administrators and will be skilled in running and setting up software and services on the internet, instead of locally on a physical computer or server.

Indiana needs to close the skills gap in Cloud computing, "so, our information technology programs have shifted," Crooks said. "As you can imagine, IT is ever changing. Cloud computing is the next phase in information technology."

Students who pursue the program will come out with several different certifications. They could go directly into the workforce or transfer into a baccalaureate program.

In other developments:

—In May, the Union Health Foundation gifted $1 million to Ivy Tech Terre Haute to expand the college's School of Nursing enrollment capacity and provide support to the School of Health Sciences in developing a pipeline for future health care professionals. The gift is the largest in campus history.

—The college, in partnership with ISU, expanded the Pathway to Blue program for the 2021-22 academic year and welcomed 35 students into the program for fall 2021. This invite-only program offers students a bridge from high school to Indiana State through Ivy Tech.

—Vigo County opened the new 800-acre Ruble Park, with Ivy Tech serving as the trailhead and main entrance.

In partnership with the Vigo County commissioners, the campus built a new shelter and restroom facility on the southwest corner of Ivy Tech's main campus to serve park patrons.

Sue Loughlin can be reached at 812-231-4235 or at sue.loughlin@tribstar.com Follow Sue on Twitter @TribStarSue.