This commentary is by Thomas Christopher Greene, founding president emeritus of Vermont College of Fine Arts, former president of the Vermont Higher Education Council, former member of the New England Commission on Higher Education, and a best-selling novelist.
The recent news that UVM is expecting more liberal arts students than anticipated in next fall’s class after cutting budgets in the College of Arts and Sciences only serves to highlight the missed opportunity that this moment in time presents for Vermont’s flagship university.
The university leadership is right that we are in a period of profound and disruptive change in higher education. One only need to look around our small state. In recent years, Burlington College, Green Mountain College, College of St. Joseph, Marlboro College and the New England Culinary Institute have all closed. The state college system is currently going through a massive restructuring that will result in three institutions becoming one.
Some prognosticators think that nationally we will see the most colleges close in the next 10 years since the Civil War, when in the aftermath there literally were not enough students because they had died on the battlefield.
Meanwhile, the cost of college continues to rise, innovation remains mostly stagnant, and we exist primarily in an 19th -century educational model whose relevance is deservedly under scrutiny. The demographics aren’t promising, especially in the Northeast. There are, simply, far fewer high school graduates.
So, it is perhaps no surprise that UVM leadership is responding to this existential crisis by introducing austerity measures, and a budgeting methodology driven by enrollment interests and, presumably, measurable career outcomes as opposed to a clear sense of mission and purpose.
This is exactly the wrong approach.
While it is true that fragile institutions are struggling, especially those that are rural, undergraduate and non-elite, elite liberal arts institutions and Ivy League schools have never been stronger. Their acceptance rates have plummeted at the same time that their sticker prices have grown to outrageous levels, and their philanthropy is such that many have endowments larger than the GDP of small countries. They have never been in greater demand.
Thankfully, many of them are using their newfound resources to expand educational opportunities to traditionally marginalized populations and funding new initiatives consistent with important global prerogatives.
As for UVM, by no measure is it fragile. In fact, in a time of change, it has an extraordinary opportunity to take a quantum leap. Instead of cutting budgets, it should be investing significantly, especially in faculty and, yes, especially in the liberal arts.
For its entire existence, UVM has been nipping around the edges of becoming a public Ivy. Like a grand old house with great bones, UVM is not far from becoming what it has always aspired to be. It has a great location, a committed teaching faculty, devoted alums and a beautiful campus.
What if it said it wanted to be University of Virginia, or University of Michigan, only smaller? Perhaps with unique foci for its region, and strengths.
More expansively, where is the vision? Now is a time when UVM could show what a 21st-century public institution could look like and make a huge difference not only in the life of Vermonters, but in work that could resonate across the globe.
Focusing narrowly on sustainability in this environment is the right play for small, struggling institutions. For a place like UVM? They should take this moment to dare to dream big.
