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July 1, 2005
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| Minneapolis Community and Technical College was created from the merger of Minneapolis Community College and the Minneapolis Technical College. (MPR Photo/Art Hughes) |
St. Paul, Minn. — Chancellor Jim McCormick inherited the still-developing MnSCU system when he arrived here from Pennsylvania four years ago. The merged institutions were still reeling from a state report that found some administrative disarray and little consensus that the merger was a good thing.
McCormick was the first head of the newly-merged Pennsylvania state college system. He says combining those 14 state universities was much easier than bringing together the three established Minnesota systems under one roof. He says his first priority became finding and setting a course based on a broad view of what the system had to offer.
"My job was not only to be a leader of what would be yielded up in terms of recommendations from the campuses and presidents, but look at statewide needs," McCormick said. "So I came not to tear it apart but to lead all of us together to make it better."
McCormick's administration gets positive marks for aligning classroom credit transfers, a complicated and contentious process that drew a large number of complaints. McCormick said the system is now delivering on the vision created at the merger's start to provide further education opportunities to even the most far-flung students.
"We've developed wonderful collaborative relationships," he said. "We have 56 programs on two year colleges that allow students to earn four year degrees without leaving that campus. That would not have been possible without us having these working relationships."
The Minnesota legislature passed the bill that created the MnSCU system in the waning moments of the 1991 session. Despite several subsequent attempts to repeal or change the legislation, the state's universities, community colleges and technical colleges were folded together on July 1st, 1995.
Seven months later the Minneapolis Community College formalized a merger agreement with its neighbor, the Minneapolis Technical College. The Community College was struggling with budget problems and employee layoffs. Merging the two schools created even more tension for staff who perceived administrators' push to streamline as another excuse to cut programs.
The two schools had already consciously avoided duplication, so merging came naturally, according to Josephine Reed-Taylor, the Minneapolis Community and Technical College Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs.
"This idea about job loss among faculty and that kind of thing was not really a concern for us even though the perception in MnSCU institutions was that was going to happen," she said. "So it was a great marriage as far as students were concerned."
Now, Reed Taylor said, there is no way to distinguish between students taking courses to learn new job skills and those who are earning credits toward a four-year degree. Those blurred lines, though, create additional problems as instructors work to maintain their sense of mission. Teaching skills to students who go on to be pilots or licensed nurses, for instance, is different than the concept-driven focus for students interested in English or advanced research.
Those same concerns arose again this year as MCTC made room on campus for a third institution, the Minneapolis branch of the four-year Metropolitan State University based in St. Paul. It's not a formal merger, but students for each institution now study in the same library, eat in the same cafeteria, and register for classes at the same admissions windows.
President Phillip Davis says this type of venture broadens the potential pathways for a large number of people.
"Forty percent of students in American higher education are in community colleges," Davis said. "About the same percentage according to the National Science Foundation get some or all of their math and science education in a community college. So it just makes sense for universities like Metropolitan State and colleges like MCTC and their faculty to sit down and align their curriculum."
There are lingering concerns among faculty about the quality of courses, but Davis insists the three separate functions can coexist under one roof as long as their efforts are strictly defined and well-planned.
"We think better articulation in our curriculum and discussion among faculty strengthens all of us," she said.
There remain those in MnSCU who believe the merger only dilutes each system's functions.
David Bratt, chair of the Winona State University Theater and Dance Department, said the MnSCU administration can't adequately balance the needs for the job-focused technical schools and the liberal arts pursuits of the universities.
"It certainly has made faculty at the four year universities feel the values of those institutions aren't receiving as much attention at the state level," Bratt said.
Bratt has been at Winona State for 27 years. He worries the merger advances a perception that the universities are little more than four-year vocational schools. Bratt's Winona State colleague, psychology professor Mary Kesler said the system's bureaucracy allows less local control.
"I don't think faculty feel they have kind of input they had before the merger in the system," she said.
Kesler, who heads WSU's Faculty Association admits such criticisms come largely from those remaining from before the merger ten years ago. But, by definition, she said, the merged system benefits the needs of the collection at the expense of the one.
"What can happen is there tends to be focus on uniformity in policies and other kinds of things which may or may not fit an individual institution," Kesler said.
Both Kesler and Bratt agree the merged system appears to have helped organize funding requests from the legislature for building and renovation projects. Lawmakers, they said, seem willing to reward a coordinated approach that compares and ranks the proposals. Administration officials say they're aware of continuing concerns about focus and representing the needs of individual institutions.
Linda Baer, Sr. Vice Chancellor for Academic and Student Affairs, was in the administration at Bemidji State University. She said after 10 years the common language among the the varied interests in the system is mostly established. She said what some people perceive as conflicts between the academic and vocational missions, she sees as expanded opportunities for students.
"In my way of thinking it was blending the best of both worlds in our higher education system making a better graduate," Baer said. "A person more ready for lifelong learning."
The MnSCU administration is busy consolidating employees from remote offices to newly leased space at their downtown St. Paul headquarters. They plan to commemorate their 10 years in existance with events later this year.
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