ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â

Good morning.

Thank you for coming out to help us kick off our 150th school year. We have reached quite a milestone together.

Today is our New Year’s Day. We look back at our accomplishments and move ahead with our goals and resolutions for the new academic year.

In the last few years at this gathering, we listened to speeches somewhat trepidatiously, but that shouldn’t be the case today.

We have good news to share, progress and achievements to celebrate, and much for which to be grateful. But do know this: ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â will not thrive if we spend our time hoping for a return to the good old days. We must continue moving forward. We have had a great start, thanks to you.

We expect our students to be resilient in the face of challenges. If they need inspiration, they should look to all of you.

You understood the challenges ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â, and all higher education, is facing. You stepped up to the hard work and began making things better. You have shown remarkable resilience, and I thank you for it.

Last year, I introduced a list of Presidential Goals to help us follow the Strategic Plan and ensure ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â’s bright future.

The first goal is to keep every student who comes to ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â. That starts with retention and persistence. Today, I am proud to announce that we are making progress.

Our retention rate has hovered around 70 percent for most of the past decade. That is on par with many similar schools, but we can—and we must—do better.

While we won’t know until after classes begin, early estimates, based on collected data, show that our retention rate for last year’s, full-time, degree-seeking, undergraduate students has improved by over three percentage points compared to the previous year. This seemingly small increase is a big victory, and it’s happening because of your growing student-centeredness. 

A couple of examples:

• Last August, during welcome week, custodian Jennifer Sutter was working in Folger Hall when a student approached her and asked how to get a job on campus. Jennifer was unsure, but she knew that our admissions staff are well connected, so she stopped what she was doing and walked the student to Sutton Hall. Along the way, they got to know each other. Once they reached Sutton, Jennifer introduced the student to Donovan Daniel. Donovan took it from there and showed the student how she could find a job.
  
  
• This past Sunday night, university photographer Brian Henry was taking pictures at the Playfair event at Miller Stadium. A student approached him, asking for help. She had lost her keys. That’s cause for panic. Brian asked for her name and phone number and began to look. Near the stage, he spotted a set of keys. He snapped a photo and texted the student. She confirmed they were hers and came to claim them. She thanked Brian profusely and said how much his willingness to help meant to her.

The big work we do every day helps our students reach their academic goals. But the little things, like what Jennifer, Donovan, and Brian did, show our students that we’re here so they can succeed. We need even more of that level of care.

Putting our students at the center of all we do is a culture change, and that can be very hard. But you’ve demonstrated that small things, done daily, add up.

Jennifer, Donovan, and Brian please stand and be recognized.

Our Navigators are helping guide our students to success.

Charged with helping every ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â student who needs assistance, no matter the subject or difficulty, our Navigators have made a huge difference.

Whether it’s supporting a student who has learned of the death of a family member, helping one understand a syllabus, walking one to the counseling center, talking one through a personal challenge, assisting one with a financial aid question, pushing one to bet on themselves, aiding one facing food insecurity, or lending a listening ear to one needing to vent, our Navigators have been a key resource, and that’s why we need them.

But that’s only part of the story.

The other part is that you have been using the student success infrastructure to help students. Last year, more than 500 alerts were sent to our Navigators by faculty and staff. Those alerts were about students facing challenges. Because you raised the alert, navigators acted, helping students before it was too late.

Erica is an international student with a 4.0 GPA in the Health Services Administration master’s program. Last year, she was struggling with a financial crisis and had to pay her outstanding balance before she could continue.

Erica reached out to her Navigator, Maria Denison, and Maria began contacting people she knew could help Erica. Maria contacted Dean’s Associate Jonathon Cooper, Emma Archer from the Office of International Education, Director of Financial Aid Tiffany Potts, and faculty member Scott Decker, and the five of them fixed the problem. The coordinated result was a paid assistantship that gave Erica financial support to continue her studies at ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â.

That’s the kind of teamwork we need. Keeping every student who comes to ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â is done one student at a time, and we must work together to do it.

Jonathon couldn’t make it today. Maria, Emma, Tiffany, and Scott please stand and be recognized.

Two other Presidential Goals are to educate other student groups and to grow ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â’s reputation. Our plan to create Pennsylvania’s first public college of osteopathic medicine is one great example of addressing those goals.

Thanks to support inside and outside ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â, we are getting closer every day to having the pieces in place for accreditation.

We must raise new funds for staff, faculty, facilities renovations, and $38 million for escrow before we enroll medical students.

Thanks to investments from the state legislature and the governor, the State System, the Foundation for ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â, the ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â Alumni Association, our alumni and other donors, and many of you, we have raised $27.8 million so far. Also, ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â has verbal and written commitments from hospitals and other facilities for more than half the clinical rotations required for accreditation.

We are on track to open the medical school in the fall of 2027 and are excited about how it will benefit ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â. The college of osteopathic medicine will bring new student groups to ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â and raise our academic profile. Our graduates will keep rural Pennsylvanians healthier decades into the future. Thank you.

Our elected state officials have recently placed greater importance on higher education in Pennsylvania. While we still are near the bottom of the country in terms of state support per student, the budget for this fiscal year includes a 6 percent increase in base appropriations for the State System. The increase allows the State System to freeze tuition for the seventh consecutive year.

As for ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â, the State System Board of Governors approved the results of the funding allocation formula, giving ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â a boost to 7 percent. Getting more than the allocated 6 percent is a tangible recognition of your hard work building ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â’s future.

In addition, ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â will receive one-time funding that will allow us to eliminate our bond debt and replenish the reserves we have been using to offset the deficit in our auxiliaries. This relief is vital to putting ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â back on stable financial ground, and we are most thankful.

If you get a chance, let State Senator Joe Pittman and State Representative Jim Struzzi know how much we appreciate their support.

A drop in enrollment has affected nearly every college and university nationwide. In response, we have made difficult decisions to reduce workforce, reshape academic offerings, and reimagine the campus to put us on more solid footing. These decisions have caused some grief and concern. Change is hard but necessary if we are to thrive.

I am in awe of how so many of you have risen to the challenge and found new, simpler, and better ways to do business, despite challenges in resources and time.

Whether it be turning over 10,000 beds in our residence halls in just a matter of weeks, keeping up with the technology needs of our students, faculty, and staff, maintaining the 354 acres we call home, coaching more than 400 student-athletes to numerous conference and regional championships, or helping one student have a good day, you all have continued to show what’s special about ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â: the people.

I have just shared a lot of great news. However, we still have some concerns.

Last year at this time, we were optimistic that our enrollment would go up, and it did. In reversing an 11-year slide, we had the largest boost, in terms of number of students, in the State System.

This year, we are not as confident that we will see an increase. The main issue has been the FAFSA debacle. The federal government revamped the FAFSA form and the processes behind it, then found it was riddled with mistakes and didn’t get the new data to us until this spring, months later than usual. We can’t award state or federal financial aid without the data.

This meant many students did not get a complete financial aid offer until this spring, narrowing their window to make a college choice.

Consequently, the number of new students who have deposited and registered for this year has been behind last year’s pace, although the gap has been closing. Demographics suggested increased enrollment this year, but because of the FAFSA issue, we cannot confidently expect our total headcount to be higher than last year.

Enrollment has a big impact on our financial situation.

The increase in state appropriations helps, as does your good work to save money and increase revenue.

In May, we projected a combined deficit across the Education and General and Auxiliary budgets totaling roughly $16 million. Thanks to your good work and the support of our legislature and Governor Shapiro, today that estimate is under $9 million.

There is more work to do. But we have made significant progress. Our goal is to retain control of our destiny. That will happen only if we keep chipping away at the deficits and remain fiscally responsible.

At the beginning of 2024, Governor Shapiro introduced a blueprint for fixing higher education in Pennsylvania. We all agreed with his principles that Pennsylvania needs to do a better job investing in higher education, that we must make higher education affordable for students and their families, and that Pennsylvania’s colleges and universities must do more to prepare the educated workforce the commonwealth needs.

 ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â and the State System have been working hard to improve the things we control, like keeping college affordable. What passed the legislature and was signed by Governor Shapiro includes the funding increases I mentioned above. It also includes these three pieces:

1. It creates a State Board of Higher Education to build strategy and coordinate across all sectors of higher education. (The State System has a strategy and direction.)
2. It creates a working group to develop a performance funding allocation formula for the state-related universities—Penn State, Pitt, Temple, and Lincoln. (The current State System formula recognizes achievements in key areas and works well.)
3. It provides new grant programs for students who seek degrees in high-demand areas, one for Pennsylvanians and one for out-of-state students. The grants become loans if the students graduate and don’t stay in the state to work.

We’ll be watching the development of these new initiatives. ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â and the State System will have a role where it makes sense.

State System Chancellor Dan Greenstein announced that he is resigning and will wrap up his duties October 11. The State System Board of Governors will appoint an interim chancellor. The interim will begin in October and serve until a permanent chancellor is selected.

And you can forget the rumors: I will not be the interim chancellor.

We’ll learn more about the specifics in the weeks ahead, but I’m confident that the search will include opportunities for input from a broad range of stakeholders.

We are facing some difficult challenges. They come in one of the most difficult periods higher education has ever faced.

Last year, I told you that only 36 percent of Americans had great confidence in higher education, and that figure had been dropping over the years.

The good news is that in this year’s poll, the percentage did not drop. The bad news is that it did not go up. It’s still 36 percent.

It’s a difficult issue for us to address. Last week was the annual ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â Council of Trustees retreat. One trustee made an important point: Our job is not to solve the problems of all higher education. Rather, our job is to ensure everyone knows that ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â does an amazing job preparing our students to work, live, and lead, and that we do so at a bargain price.

We’re good at what we do, and our work has strong value. We cannot let the naysayers affect us. Let’s keep rowing.

Before I finish up, I want to do a little teaching.

At ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â, some buildings are relatively new, some parts of campus are getting fresh updates, and new faces are arriving every day. However, the core of ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â has remained the same: amazing facilities, a beautiful campus, expert faculty who care about students, and administrators and staffers who do some heavy lifting every day—all for the benefit of our students.

Here’s an advertisement in The Indiana Progress from April, 1875, about six weeks before we opened as Indiana Normal School. In announcing the school’s start on May 17, it says that “every effort will be made to make this school equal, if not superior, to any other institution of the kind in the country.”

Forty-one years later, on June 7, 1916, the headline in The Indiana Progress was this: “Indiana State Normal School is the Pride of Similar Pennsylvania Institutions. Fine Buildings, Beautiful Campus, Excellent Equipment, and an Unsurpassed Corps of Instructors Have Brought Largest Attendance of Any State Normal to Indiana.”

We are no longer the largest school in what’s now the State System. Otherwise, this headline from 108 years ago is still true. Many of our sister schools envy what we always have had.

In 1965, when we were Indiana State Teachers College, we gained university status. That didn’t sit well with many of our sister schools, but we didn’t let that hold us back. It wasn’t until the State System was created in 1983 that the other 13 schools joined us as universities.

When the State System was being constructed, the people leading ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â at the time ensured that we could continue to stand taller than the rest as the only PhD-granting university in the system.

The point of my lesson is that ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â has always, always been ahead of the others—in and out of the state system—disrupting common notions about normal schools, subverting the dominant paradigm, and changing the world. We must carry ourselves as such. We must look forward. We must change and evolve. We must not slow down to let the pack catch up.

That’s why things like the Navigators, the proposed college of osteopathic medicine, the Academic Restructuring, and the Long-Range Facilities Master Plan are essential to our future.

We cannot be like the others.

Never have been. Never should be.

And, at a time when trying to maintain the status quo or resurrect the past means decline and death, we won’t be.

I say again how proud I am of the work done last year to strengthen ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â. I am excited about what’s to come as the ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â of the future becomes the ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â of today.

I know that we will continue doing remarkable things at ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â. Let’s keep leading, keep building, keep growing, and keep making ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â the best it can be.

Thank you.

And now … it’s my pleasure to present, under the direction of Ms. Cassidy Nalepa, the Pride of Pennsylvania, the Beast of the East, the Legend, the ÑÇÉ«Ó°¿â Marching Band!