This commentary is by Alison S. Lathrop, who retired from the Lyndon campus in May 2022 as a professor of geology after serving for 23 years. She has also taught at Johnson and Castleton, and spent 1.5 years in a senior administration role at Lyndon.
Bill Schubart’s column March 26 neatly highlights the fundamental problem with the Vermont State Colleges system when he labels it financially nonviable, although the real cause is not what he describes.
The fundamental problem is that the Vermont State College system was designed to be supported by legislative appropriation, as directed by the VSC Manual of Policies and Procedures, Statute and ByLaws 2171.a: … which shall plan, supervise, administer and operate facilities for education above the high school level supported in whole or in substantial part with state funds….
Given that the Vermont Legislature has gradually but inexorably abrogated its financial responsibility to the Vermont State Colleges (soon Vermont State University) over the intervening decades and, instead, sought to shift nearly the entire burden to individual students and Vermont State College employees, it should be no surprise that the colleges are no longer financially viable.
There is a limit to what students can or should pay for college. Given paltry legislative support, Vermont maintains the highest in-state tuition and fees in the country, creating a burden on students that often requires them either to move out-of-state to find a job with which they can pay off their loans, or lately, eschew college altogether like the 40% of northern Vermont high school students who do not choose college.
This is a curious situation for a state that often bemoans the loss of its youth when it could benefit from grads remaining in state and starting businesses. Students attracted from other states by Vermont’s beauty often would choose to remain but are precluded from doing so by even higher out-of-state tuition and fees. This is an acute tragedy for rural northern Vermonters in particular.
Mr. Schubart mentions the ”sheer financial burden of tenured and administrative personnel and physical infrastructure.” Again, no surprise, although the truth behind that burden is never mentioned. Vermont State College faculty are historically deeply underpaid, including benefits, offered compensation far below that of their colleagues elsewhere in the country’s state college systems. Personally, I took a one-third pay/benefits cut to join the Vermont State Colleges, a disparity that remained throughout my entire Vermont career.
That was my choice, based on the opportunity to return to an ancestral home and teach the spectacular geology of Vermont, but it should never have been an expectation. Make no mistake — Vermont State Colleges full-time faculty remain here because of their dedication to students and their willingness to build professional mentoring relationships over years with students who depend on having reliable access to them throughout college and beyond — a situation not offered by the Community College model staffed by part-time faculty who may or may not return in any given semester.
Unfortunately for Vermont students, the Legislature seems to prefer the Community College model for all students, regardless of their hopes and dreams for the future.
Vermont now oscillates between 49th and 50th in its support for public higher education. For some, this remains a matter of pride. In the 1970s, Gov. Dean, followed later by Gov. Snelling, strongly endorsed an approach called the Vermont Model, wherein direct aid to Vermont’s public colleges and university was kept at a bare minimum, and whatever state aid that did arrive was to be split between the institutions and the Vermont Student Assistance Corp., a program that was founded upon the socially just premise that poor Vermonters deserved to be able to attend college out of state if they wished. A laudable premise, but one that still sends already meager state funding out of Vermont.
Bruce Post, director of federal affairs at VSAC in the early 2000s, wrote a historical analysis of the Vermont Model in 1995, stating that the intent of the Vermont Model was to cause UVM and the Vermont State Colleges to “compete intensively with schools in other states” for students, thereby driving educational improvements. The model was also a boon to taxpayers because “we have the lowest tax burden for higher education in the country”.
Fast forward to today, when the Vermont State College system is declared not financially viable, supposedly because it has not adapted to change, though UVM (a topnotch research institution including a medical school) and Community College of Vermont (a community college devoid of full-time faculty, designed to provide a low-cost, nearby entry to higher education for Vermonters) have.
At the very least, mission, operational costs, state support and tuition differ among these institutions, making such comparisons superficial.
The Vermont State University campuses continually commit to productive change. Faculty demonstrate professional and pedagogical currency as a condition of employment and devote countless hours to meshing curriculum with vocational needs.
Faculty do not, however, embrace the latest methods if they will hurt students. We taught remotely through the pandemic using online resources and zoom classes. Our students would not choose that moving forward. Many couldn’t participate because of insufficient broadband (still bad!), limited devices (phones aren’t productive for classes), or physical limitations (pain while studying from a screen, which differs from flicking through social media).
Yet the Legislature insists on digital “transformation” instead of recommitting to its fundamental responsibility: supporting Vermont students seeking affordable, quality higher education with professional mentorship close enough to home in this time of frequent career change. Tragedy for Vermonters.
