A Presentation To The South Carolina Commission on Higher Education Adapting to the ‘New Normal’ Nationally, in South Carolina, and at Winthrop University

A Presentation To The

South Carolina Commission on Higher Education

Adapting to the ‘New Normal’

Nationally, in South Carolina, and at Winthrop University

August 2010

Making Higher Education A State Priority in S.C.

• Over the years, there has been no stronger proponent than Winthrop in encouraging South Carolina to identify a set of common ends for higher education that meet societal needs of this state and its citizens.

• Over the years, we have called repeatedly for a set of goals and objectives to address collectively and collaboratively as a network of educational enterprises, while still fulfilling our respective institutional missions in ways consistent with our respective core values.

• That work this year is more important than ever, as our state and others face a shrinking revenue base at a time when America needs more than ever to be investing in higher education.

Making Higher Education a priority in S.C. – and nationally

• Earlier this week, a Preface for this presentation was sent to you, outlining the congruence among initiatives completed over the past year by the S.C. Higher Education Study Committee and CHE, by the Public Comprehensive Universities Sector (through collaboration with NCHEMS,) and a new initiative announced just last month by the National Governors Association. The latter is called “Complete to Compete.”

• I hope you have had a chance to review that information as a contextual preface to today’s remarks, which I will make more specific to Winthrop and how it is adjusting to “the New Normal” in numerous ways.

Amidst work on South Carolina’s future,institutions must continue to deal with present realities

It is increasingly important to bring resources to institutions from other sources to bridge widening gaps in state support:

-- federal sources

-- donor sources

-- increasing enrollment, particularly among out-of-state tuition payers, while continuing emphasis on serving the public of South Carolina

Even more importantly:

We must recognize that ‘the New Normal’ is not only a reference to the fiscal circumstances of the public sector as the ‘Great Recession’ hopefully concludes, but also a reference to changes in expectations for how we work and what we do to prepare our students for the future.

The Vision for Winthropremains as always:

Winthrop University will be— and will be recognized as— one of the best universities

of its kind.

“Enabling Future Development of the University

Winthrop’s approach to South Carolina’s on-going economic challenges is summarized as follows:

While Managing the Demands of the Present”

Those are the dual responsibilities of our stewardship in these particular times

Winthrop’s Core Values

SERVICE: Service to the people of South Carolina is Winthrop’s highest priority. Winthrop serves by preparing our students to betomorrow’s leaders in their chosen fields and in their communities.

EXCELLENCE: A college of university is enhanced by a commitmentto excellence. Winthrop will embrace only those programs and activities we can deliver at an exemplary level.

DIVERSITY: A college or university is enriched by the diversity of itsPeople. Winthrop nurtures diversity because diversity gives meaning to our sense of community, enhances creativity, teaches flexibility and builds strength from difference.

COMMUNITY: Winthrop is a community of learners built around high expectations and high purposes. Winthrop expects all members of the campus community to use their unique talents to leave the university a better place.

The ‘Vision of Distinction’ and its roles

• The ‘Vision’ annual update process keeps us attuned to what it means to be “market-wise” as the economy and other circumstances change.

•The ‘Vision’ serves as a guide for all personnel regarding what we are doing in any given year and why we are doing it.

• The ‘Vision’ communicates to the public about Winthrop values, goals, objectives and accomplishments.

• The ‘Vision’ provides internal and external accountability and progress reporting over time.

Vision of Distinction Strategic Goals Toward fulfillment of which annual initiatives are directed

Winthrop articulates our ultimate goals in six areas:

• University Community

• Student Body

• Academic Life

• Facilities

• Support Service

• Partnerships and Collaborations

The Winthrop University Planning Process FlowThe Winthrop University Planning Process Flow Chart:Chart:

Institutional Effectiveness

and Accountability

Winthrop University

--Vision of

Distinction --

Mission

Resource Allocation

Annual

Initiatives and

Objectives

Strategic Values/

Long Range Goals and

Directions

The Changing Landscape in South Carolina

New Market Realities:

• Last year, we told you about 14 percent of our revenue would come from the State of South Carolina. This year, that

number will be down to just 10 percent. (By comparison, when most of this year’s students were born, Winthrop received about 40% of its revenue from the State of South Carolina.)

• This new reality means that 90 percent of Winthrop’s revenue comes from elsewhere – the federal government, donors/grants and student fees.

• Winthrop will be responsive to state mandates, but we also have to be even more responsive to those who provide 90% of our revenues.

The ‘New Normal’at Winthrop University

Winthrop’s Continuing Priorities:

1. Ensuring the continuing national-caliber quality of the academic experience at Winthrop.

2. Continuing to provide a safe and secure campus.

3. Continuing recruitment of the high-achieving, socially responsible and inclusive student body for which Winthrop is known.


Winthrop’s Additional Priority:

To be disciplined in current era of transformational change that is

so profoundly affecting every aspect of living

that it has been dubbed by some as ‘The Shift Age’--

and this change isn’t only about money!

As the Information Age gives way to The Shift Age, the world is entering a time of transformation and change that offers both great risk and incredible opportunity.

In his book, “The Shift Age,” author David Houle identifies the dynamics and forces that already have reshaped and will continue to reshape the world for the next 20 years and explains that we have entered the final, global stage of humanity's cultural, social, and economic evolutionary journey: the Shift Age.

What is ‘The Shift Age’?

An important discussion for these times: Will public higher education lead American institutions in thoughtful adaptation to ‘The Shift Age’ – or will we risk loss of relevance to the public we serve because we resist transformation?


“It is not the strongest of the species

that survives, nor the most intelligent,

but the one most responsive to change.”

-- Charles Darwin


What Does Winthrop Need To ConsiderTo Be Prepared To Succeed

In ‘The Shift Age?’

Our Response: ‘Readiness Winthrop’

Winthrop in April announced an initiative called ‘ Readiness Winthrop’ that is focused on developing appropriate responses to these profound changes.

– Phase One – Adjusting to state appropriation reductions and aligning spending with resources for the current academic year while completing programmatic alterations already underway and undertaking the deeper work of Phase Two.

– Phase Two– Reviewing, re-evaluating, reflecting, and re-imagining all we do, while retaining our dedication to quality and value.


This isn’t a new challenge for Winthrop, as our chartering legislation requires us to

focus on change when needed:

‘[The board of trustees] shall possess all the power necessary for the accomplishment of the trust

committed to it: the establishment, conduct and maintenance of a

first-class institution of higher education… as the progress of the times may require.’

Highlights of Work Already Underway

• Winthrop is creating an Academic Success Center that will bring together long-standing institutional and new federal resources to boost retention and persistence toward on-time degree attainment among all students. The federally supported aspect of the initiative is called “Focusing on Collegiate Undergraduate Success” (FOCUS.) So far, $350,000 in federal funds have been committed to the program.

• Winthrop is developing programs to expand and enhance programs that will facilitate development of global perspectives among students across their collegiate experience.


• Winthrop continues to emphasize and fine-tune its ‘Touchstones’ foundational courses designed to assist students in developing capacities that will serve them in adapting to change throughout their lives.

•Winthrop is moving toward a Center for Inter-disciplinary Studies that will enable selected students to design their own majors and develop other specialized programs that span traditional boundaries.

• Winthrop is expanding the ways in which students can choose to ‘professionalize their passion,’ by adding a minor in business to an array of majors, from the sciences to the arts.


• Winthrop is developing an array of five-year

programs culminating in a master’s degree.

For example, major in any Bachelor of Arts degree program offered at Winthrop, minor in business

administration and earn an M.B.A. in the fifth year.


Winthrop continues to support its faculty in the sciences as they seek and utilize federal funds to conduct an array of research, engaging students as co-investigators, in fields such as:

• The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has awarded Winthrop faculty member Heather Evans-Anderson a $419,115 grant to aid her ongoing cardiac research on marine-dwelling invertebrates that can repair damaged muscle cells of their hearts, to see if the process can be translated to mammals.

• The NIH Cancer Institute awarded Winthrop University faculty member Takita Felder Sumter a $232,500 grant to investigate what transforms normal cells into cancer cells. • The National Science Foundation awarded Winthrop University faculty member Robin Lammi a $251,274 grant to investigate the role amyloid-beta protein plays in the underlying cause of Alzheimer's disease.


Winthrop has received a pair of federal awards (one is the largest in Winthrop history) to work with a number of regional and Pee Dee school systems to improve learning, teacher mentorship and school leadership. Components of the program include:

• NetSCOPE– (Network of Sustained, Collaborative, Ongoing Preparation for Educators) is designed to improve student academic achievement from kindergarten through 12th grade.

• NetLEAD -- (Network of Leaders for Equity, Achievement, and Development) will help 11 rural, high-need districts groom a new generation of leaders as many current principals and assistant principals reach retirement.


NetSCOPE– will involve the Rock Hill, Fort Mill, Clover, York, Lancaster County, Chester County, Fairfield County, Union County and Cherokee County school districts, and will bring approximately $7 million in federal funds to Winthrop from 2009-2014.

NetLEAD -- will assist 84 partner schools in the Chester, Cherokee, Dillon 1-2-3, Fairfield, Marion 1-2-7, Marlboro, and Union school districts. Winthrop is to receive $3.4 million in federal funds 2010-2015 for this program.

The Work Ahead

In the good old days, educational readiness was about delivering the 3 R’s – reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmetic.”

In ‘The Shift Age,’ it takes several more R’s. To achieve readiness for a post-Shift Age world, Winthrop will:

• Review what we do and how we do it.• Re-evaluate how we can do it all more effectively and efficiently, while keeping faith with our essential values • Reflect upon what is key for every student to know, and how we can use emerging technologies to assist their knowing.• Reshape and re-organize ourselves – so that we achieve the readiness that is our goal for this process.

The trailing edge of all the above will be to reduce our level of spending while retaining our dedication to quality and value.

Changing Realities in Higher Ed Budgeting: … further declining state support

*

Appropriations14.3%

Student Tuition and Fees

50.2%

Contracts and Grants17.2%

Auxiliary Enterprises

10.3%

Other8.0%

This time last year: Winthrop Projected Revenues for FY2009-10

Changing Realities in Higher Ed Budgeting: … further declining state support

*

And now: Winthrop’s Projected Revenues for FY2010-11

* Note: Federal stimulus appropriation of $3.3 million will expire on June 30, 2011.

*

Looking back two decades ago, an era when most of today’s college students were born

Appropriations40%

Student Tuition and Fees28%

Contracts and Grants11%

Auxiliary Enterprises15%

Other6%

Revenues: 1990-91

Revenues 2010-11

1990-91 StateAppropriations 40%

2010-11 StateAppropriations

10%

2000-2001 Appropriation to Winthrop $ 25,404,503

2011-2012 Projected Appropriation to Winthrop $ 12,847,592

(With Federal Stimulus Funds Expired)

Here is the major reason why tuition increases!

A 50.5 percent reduction in state investment in S.C. youth and S.C.’s future

Operating Funds Are Not the Only Concern Capital Needs Addressed Virtually Without State Support

Carroll Hall• College of Business Administration

• Opened Fall 2009

• Features Carroll Trading and Training Floor

Operating Funds Are Not the Only Concern Capital Needs Addressed Virtually Without State Support

Campus capital needs eventually have had to be addressed through fees to meet student needs andmaintain Winthrop quality

Campus Center

• Opens August 2010• Facilities for student organizations, meeting spaces, theater, post office, bookstore, food services, Student Life staff and more• 187 jobs were created for the region by this investment

Winthrop’s Next Horizons Capital NeedsStill unmet… and the calendar keeps turning

Winthrop’s Priority Current Unfunded Academic Building Capital Need:

A 21st century library and information technology center, to be used by all students regardless of major

Estimated Cost: $50 Million

Statewide Budget Considerations

• Long-term, comprehensive state tax reform remains an essential element for positive growth and development for all sectors of South Carolina. Tax Re-alignment Commission recommendations need to be followed and assessed to determine what capacity they will provide to meet institutional operating needs.

• S.C. needs a fair and equitable distribution method so operating budgets can be stronger as a means of holding down tuition and fees.

• Verifiable formula-based plan is best means to a fair and equitable allocation.

The current funding situation is a threat to institutional quality

built over two decades at Winthrop…

http://www.winthrop.edu/NSSE/default.htm

http://www.collegeandcharacter.org/

… and a threat to S.C. students’ access to that quality,

so that our state can continue to develop the next generation of citizen-professionals

who will be ready to lead when their time comes.

• It is well and good for all of us to talk about what members of the public higher education community should, can and are doing to work more efficiently and effectively with the state resources devoted to higher education.

• But the fact remains: Declining state resources aren’t the only – perhaps not even the major – challenge facing our state in this age of pervasive change and ever-evolving definitions of ‘the New Normal.’

Some final thoughts for today:

Consider these wise words:

‘…But few among our political leaders appear to … appreciate the changing levels of knowledge needed to function effectively in today’s society.

‘Once, Americans thought everyone should have around a fourth grade education, then the line gradually moved up to the eighth grade and finally to the end of high school. But the line of minimum necessity has long since crossed into higher education; now, if all you have is a high school diploma, you’re a knowledge economy dropout.

‘Culture change is the only real path to competitiveness for our nation, and time is short….’

-- Dr. Garrison Walters, Executive Director,S.C. Commission on Higher Education,

writing in ‘Inside Higher Ed,’ July 15, 2010

“It is not the strongest of the species

that survives, nor the most intelligent,

but the one most responsive to change.”

-- Charles Darwin

An important means…

… to an essential end

Thank you for your continuing serviceto the State of South Carolina

Documents

A Presentation To The South Carolina Commission on Higher Education Adapting to the ‘New Normal’ Nationally, in South Carolina, and at Winthrop University