Driving forces: Draft Report

 

Stakeholders identified a myriad of issues they considered driving forces in a survey, an Oct. 20 hearing, e-mails and informal discussions. Driving Forces and Internal Scan Task Force members submitted reports ranging from one to 11 pages. The following is a list of driving forces and issues members felt particularly relevant to ASU. These are issues that the institution has the ability to address. Some issues, such as the status of athletic programs, are in the hands largely of forces beyond the institution such as the NCAA.

The following is a list of driving forces, followed by some summations in order to give them some context.

·         Rising costs in all areas, with decreasing state support as a percentage of overall costs;

·         Increased competition for resources among four-year universities in the state and region;

·         Increased competition from two-year institutions in Arkansas

·         Absence or weakness of external regulation or coordination on growth, curriculum and other matters;

·         Increased pressure for external funding;

·         Dominance of the University of Arkansas for the state’s political, financial and social resources;

·         Regional growth in transportation and accessibility;

·         Increasing need for ubiquitous web presence, rapid connectivity, use of mobile technology;

·         Increased need for technical and computer literacy;

·         Increased need for 24-hour support in student services, education and technology;

·         Regional growth in agri-business, food processing, technology and health care;

·         Globalization of the economy in all areas;

·         Decline in manufacturing in the region and the nation;

·         Increased research at ASU;

·         Arkansas Biosciences Institute and integrating it into the community;

·         Increased entrepreneurship in the institution and the community;

·         The needs and opportunities of the Delta;

·         Proximity to Memphis, the Ozarks and neighboring states;

·         Increasing numbers of transfer students and non-traditional students;

·         Growth in branch campuses, enrollment decline on the Jonesboro campus;

·         Growth in non-traditional educational approaches;

·         Growth in media-based learning, on-line education as both a supplement to education and a primary mode of education;

·         Increasing demand for distance education

·         Increased technology needs for instruction and research;

·         Growth in the Hispanic/Latino population

·         Growth in the disabled population;

·         Increased international partnerships for students, faculty and staff;

·         Needs to address diversity among faculty, staff and students;

·         Increased costs to students in tuition and fees;

·         Increased pressures for accountability and assessment from accrediting agencies, legislators and other oversight organizations;

·         ASU’s niche in the market, or lack thereof

·        ASU’s morale, sense of community, internal communication.

 

History and politics:

Arkansas State University was founded in 1909, the same year as Arkansas Tech in Russellville, and Southern Arkansas University, and two years after the University of Central Arkansas in Conway.

Twenty years earlier, the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville was founded as the state’s land-grant university and the state’s designated comprehensive university.  The University of Arkansas’ sports programs and some of its academic programs have long garnered the bulk of national, state and local attention among Arkansas universities. It also pulls in a great deal more financial and political support than other Arkansas institutions, even in the Delta region.

ASU has also developed into a comprehensive university. It officially became a university in 1967 and a university system in 2002 with branch campuses in Beebe, Heber Springs, Marked Tree Mountain Home and Newport.  Now there's a campus in Searcy, and an instructional site in Paragould.

In 1999, the state Supreme Court ruled against the state Board of higher Education when it tried to deny UCA the right to develop a Ph.D. program in physical therapy. Since the court ruled the BHE had no power to restrict program development, there is, in effect, no authority to coordinate growth or manage competition between universities in Arkansas.

Traditionally, ASU is also funded at a lower rate per pupil than other institutions. While officials try to fight for funding equity, the state legislature has not addressed the issue and may not. Therefore, it would be a mistake to assume the equity of funding will change.

The recent announcement of a Blue Ribbon Committee for Higher Education to study the needs of higher education is an example of the commitment to increasing priority for support for higher education in the state.  A key assignment of this committee will be to recommend ways of increasing funding for higher education at a time when Arkansas taxpayers are already facing possible significant tax increases to pay for the court-ordered improvements in the state’s secondary schools.

 

Geography:

Located in Jonesboro atop Crowley’s Ridge, a 200-mile long ridge of hills running from Missouri to the Mississippi River in Helena, ASU is the only major university in the entire region traditionally identified in the Mississippi Delta. The region is among the most impoverished in the nation, but it is also rich in cultural heritage. Jonesboro, at a population of 55,000, is the only major metropolitan area for more than 100 miles in most directions. However, it is conveniently located an hour northwest from Memphis, which is a major metro area and a national transportation hub. ASU is also forty minutes from the foothills of the Ozarks to the north and west. ASU is a two-hour drive from Little Rock and parts of northwest Mississippi, southeast Missouri, and West Tennessee. It is three hours from southern Illinois, western Kentucky and central Missouri. Recent and planned road improvements to put ASU on Interstate I-555 and to make it more accessible from U.S. Route 412 across Missouri and north Arkansas are expected to make ASU an even more convenient destination in the near future.

  

Student demographics and character

The total enrollment of the university system for 2003 was 10,573, a ten year high. More than 1,300 attend various branch campuses and the Jonesboro campus has seen an enrollment decline. Among all students, 45 percent are male and 55 percent are female. Almost 19 percent of the students are classified among the nation’s minority groups.  Nearly 10 percent of our students are transfer students with seventy-five percent of transfers coming from two-year institutions.  Finally, almost one third of our students are classified as non-traditional students. The trends of increased percentages among  non-traditional students and transfers are expected to continue.

Traditional students, born in the 1980s, have grown up with television and the Internet. Traditional teaching methods and pedagogy may be less effective for them. Studies have shown that interactive, visual, media-based and multi-media presentations, even entertaining approaches, may be the most effective learning tools.

 

Diversity

ASU has approximately a 18.8 percent minority student population, the majority of which, 14.3 percent, are African American.

Hispanics, despite a growing population in the region, make up only about one-half of one percent. 

International student enrollment has dropped to a low of just 1.7 percent. The decline may be related to the September 11, 2001 tragedy, but the figures dropped a half a percent in 2000 and have yet to recover.  

Approximately 8.5 percent of the university’s employee base is minority. Among full-time faculty, 11 percent are minorities and of these, 5.8 percent are African American. Hispanic numbers about one and a half percent, and Asian numbers are at almost two percent.

There has been some discussion that the school mascot name, the Indians, may be detrimental to diversity efforts, particularly in recruiting diverse faculty.

 

Rising tuition costs, trends and needs

    Because state funding and private gifts to colleges and universities have steadily decreased over the past decade, tuition increases have been a necessary measure for higher education in order to meet operational and educational needs of students. Such exploding costs have placed the dream of higher education in jeopardy for millions of low and moderate-income students and families. According to the national College Board, during the ten-year period ending in 2002-03, after adjusting for inflation, average tuition and fees at both public and private four-year colleges and universities rose 38 percent. Although tuition has run more than 100 percent ahead of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) since 1981, family income has risen only 27 percent in real terms.

Trends among many universities have been to institute tuition discounting (absorbing part of the gross tuition as institutional financial aid). Tuition discounts have grown from 2.7 percent in 1990 to 39.4 percent in the fall of 2002 according to NACUBO findings. This means that an average institution only realizes 60.6 percent of the published tuition price as net tuition. NACUBO findings anticipate that tuition discounting will most likely grow, or at least not decline significantly, as institutions strive to meet students’ needs and ensure educational access.

 

Technology

Technology needs are expected to increase substantially in many areas including:

Ubiquitous web presence – technology is increasingly providing access from almost anywhere to the Internet, creating a virtual conduit for the individual to connect to a wide range of information as well as to different communities.  Additionally, individuals expect access to high-quality, just-in-time information from expert resources.

Rapid connectivity – high speed networks, remote access, and wireless increasingly provide seamless access to educational content.  In the 2003 IT Metrics study, 97 percent of responding faculty reported having a computer at home, while only 30 percent of responding faculty reported having high-speed internet access.  As increasing amounts of educational content continue to be developed and become available, so will the needs for high-speed connectivity for faculty. 

that that will be offered.

Increasing freedom with mobile devices – increasingly, people are choosing portable, small, and wireless devices for their computing needs, which helps them realize unprecedented mobility in information and network access.  Additionally, these devices provide more capacity and functionality in a single device.  In the 2003 IT Metrics student, 84 percent of responding students reported having a computer solely dedicated to their use.  32% of the responding students reported having a notebook/laptop or other mobile computing device with internet access solely dedicated to their use.

24/7 Service Expectations – individuals anticipate service and support assistance to be 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Continued Growth in Distance Learning – the University has experienced consistent growth in distance learning programs in recent years, and will continue to experience growth in both distance courses and online learning.  IP-based video has become the common standard among collaboration technologies.

Single-Sign-On Credentials - Students, faculty, and staff will utilized single-sign-on technology to access all information from a variety of resources, including data centrally stored at ASU, and information-resources hosted by other institutions.

Information Technology Literacy – Information Technology literacy among entering students will continue to be an issue for new students, and long-term student success will be directly correlated with the IT literacy levels of incoming students.

Learning System Support – As each component of the Learning System continues to evolve and is implemented, the resource demands to technically support the environment will increase.

 

Competition from two-year schools

In the 1990’s, information published by the Arkansas Department of Higher Education showed headcount at two-year public institutions in the state increased from 17,533 in 1990 to 38,411 in 1999.  The four-year institutions, on the other hand, had 60,021 enrolled students in 1990, peaked at 62,940 in 1994, but began to decline when technical colleges became part of higher education as a result of ACT 1244. By 1999, enrollment at the states four-year public institutions had fallen to 60,814.

Of the 22 public two-year state institutions, 16 grew in double digit percentages, ranging from 15 percent to a startling 125 percent.  Fourteen of the 22 grew by 30 percent, and ten by more than 40 percent.  Three of the fastest growing institutions are located within ASU’s immediate draw area.  Those schools and their percentages of growth are ASU-Newport (125 percent), BRTC in Pocahontas (57.1 percent) and UACCB in Batesville (91.1 percent).  

Tuition at two-year schools in the state of Arkansas is far below what four-year institutions charge, and fees are rare.

Even with the outreach efforts ASU has made in recent years, there is still more to do.  Competition is strong for transfer students.

 

Regional and national economic issues:

Increasing emphasis and support from funding sources and the business sector for collaborative models of regional economic development vs. autonomous local economic development.

America’s steady decline in manufacturing jobs vs. its steady increase in service jobs.

Continued globalization of economic forces.

Rise of education, technical assistance and funding for entrepreneurship, including non-profit social entrepreneurship vs. declining emphasis on recruiting jobs from outside the community.

Continuation of information technology’s major impact on the local and regional economy, particularly as relates to (1) job growth and (2) web-based analysis of quality of life and business climate issues.

Continued trend in blending of public and private sector funding for, and delivery of, local and regional economic development.

Of the 22.2 million jobs that will be created between 2000 and 2010, the overall distribution will remain about the same in terms of education and training requirements, but the 32 percent increase in jobs requiring only an Associate degree will be higher than the 22.5 percent increase in jobs requiring a Bachelor’s degree.    While the fastest growing occupations will be in information technology, the ten occupations that will have the largest number of new jobs include only two that require much education or training - computer software engineers and registered nurses.

More local accountability, responsibility and ownership of community and economic development..

 

Increased research opportunities and pressures

The Arkansas Biosciences Consortium and the Biosciences research building bring unprecedented opportunities to ASU for faculty research. How does the ABI administration and research structure get set up in such a way to create a campus-wide environment to help the entire academic community increase its ability to do research?

Recent and new doctoral (and other graduate) programs have or will have applied (and often interdisciplinary) foci that address explicit needs of the region and state. This has/will help guarantee a market for our graduates to find employment, and also helps assure programs that can be viable for external funding.  In order to attract the best graduate students, assistantship stipends and tuition waivers must become more competitive.

With increasing emphasis on research in biosciences and across the university, how does ASU find the resources for all faculty to participate in scholarship to the full extent of their abilities?  Especially relevant here is faculty time for research in light of current teaching loads.

How does ASU assure that the primary mission of undergraduate education and the public service mission to the Delta remain a vital part of what ASU?

 

Expected educational and career opportunities in the region

In this area, where factories have been shutting down to relocate elsewhere, there is a need for retraining or adult workers.  The increase in people who speak Spanish migrating to northeast Arkansas has created a need for liaisons or translators of some type to be able to integrate children into schools, adults into the workforce, and to help with other services.

Job growth is also expected in education, health care, and government positions including, management, social services, police and forensic work; technology and  agri-business. Jonesboro has become in recent years a food processing center and there is job growth expected in that area.

That growth is expected to fuel research opportunities in agri and food-science, education in general, economic development for NEA.

 

International opportunities and forces

With growing agri-business and food processing economies in the area, there may be opportunities to work with businesses, non-governmental organizations and governments in Central and South America that have interests in these areas.

American students benefit from foreign travel and the diverse viewpoints of international students. Students with international experience may earn 10-20 percent more than students who do not.

Support for travel from foreign sources for both international students and American students is declining. At the same time, competition for international students and resources is increasing inside Arkansas and in the region and in the nation.

    Communication and image

Stakeholders in the ASU community identified communication and image as driving forces within and without the institution. Other educational institutions have identifiable niches, brands and have aggressive marketing to support them. ASU does not. Financial and other support for the institution may be deficient because of the lack of visibility, particularly in a competitive marketplace.

Within the institution, various individuals as stakeholder meetings were concerned that a lack of internal communication made ASU a less cohesive environment. Students, faculty and staff indicated they feel a lack of community on campus.

Although ASU does get some money from alumni, more work can be done to maintain contact  and build support. There may be untapped resources from "friends of the University" such as John Grisham and Bill Clinton, or other community and business leaders.