Lake Superior State University (LSSU) has been ranked the nation’s top public college by U.S. News & World Report, Interim President Dr. Lynn Gillette announced at last night’s regularly scheduled Sault Ste. Marie City Commission meeting.
New things are coming to the university — including graduate degree programs, Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) inmate education, microcredentials, and more.
Gillette took the reins as acting president in the place of former President Rodney Hanley, Ph.D., who resigned on Monday, April 3. Hanley resigned as students began to question what was happening behind presidential windows, shuttered by '$7,456 custom blinds,' as revealed by university financial records obtained from the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request submitted by political science student Riley Gilman last October.
“Steve Johnson, Dean of the College of Science and the Environment told me a couple of weeks ago that we need a president who is a president of 2,000 people, not seven or eight senior management team members,” Gillette said. “That was a really wise statement on Steve’s part. I am doing that.”
Gillette addressed rumors circulating by offering insight into where the university's financials presently stand.
“We have a balanced budget this year,” he said. “We will submit to the board, in July, a balanced budget for next year. We (along with Hanley) removed a longstanding multimillion-dollar structural deficit that had been in existence for 10 or 15 years before either myself or the previous president got here.”
LSSU is, reportedly, in good standing with its accrediting bodies.
“A whole lot of our programs have specialized accreditation, and then we have a regional accreditation with the Higher Learning Commission (HLC),” Gillette said. “A key financial index that the HLC uses is called the Composite Financial Index (CFI), and it is a composite of certain ratios. If that index is above one, you are in good shape.”
For a couple of years, that index was reported at -.08. Today, it is 2.29.
“That is a fantastic thing,” Gillette continued. “We increased our first-year retention rate of students from 66 per cent to 73 per cent last year. That is something we are monitoring all of the time. We have added over 20 academic programs in the last two years. Some of them are majors; some are associate degrees; and some are certificates. So, we have a lot of innovation on the academic side.”
Gillette noted the Center for Freshwater Research and Education (CFRE) as a center of excellence, recognized by the US Coast Guard. In 2021, LSSU was selected as the hub for the US Coast Guard National Center of Expertise (NCOE) for the Great Lakes region to examine the impacts of oil spills in freshwater environments.
“We are bringing in a great deal of grant money: federal, state, etc.,” Gillette added. “We will have an announcement in the next few weeks of a really big grant.”
Washington Monthly’s 2022 College Rankings has ranked LSSU the highest among all mid-western schools in its latest Best Bang for the Buck Midwest Colleges segment.
Something Gillette felt the university could improve upon was its Native American Center.
“Since Stephanie Sabatine (Native American Center Director) left, it had been a while since we did anything in the Native American Center,” he said. “Over the last year, we have done some incredible things.”
Bay Mills Indian Community Chair Whitney Gravelle spoke at the LSSU graduation last year. She also spoke about treaty rights during a separate event held to commemorate Indigenous Peoples Day.
Gillette then outlined a few new initiatives.
“I am not going to be afraid to make tough decisions,” he said to city commissioners. “If those tough decisions hurt me, so be it. One thing we haven’t been good enough at over the last couple of years is marketing. We are not getting the story out well enough to the community, potential students, potential donors, etc. I have already approved two new positions in marketing, and I am going to approve something that may end up costing around $180,000. It would make our website a whole lot better.”
Gillette reported that the Federal Pell Grant became state inmate eligible on July 1, 2022.
“We are working with Chippewa and Kinross Correctional facilities to offer a program in one of those two facilities starting in August,” he added. “It would be an associate degree in health and fitness.”
Gillette alluded to a conversation he had with Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) Director Patricia Caruso about the educational goals of state inmates. He learned that many of them had dreams of starting their own businesses one day.
“We will also have several business certificates,” the interim president added.
Among other news, LSSU has contracted with ReUp Education, which assists institutions in finding, enrolling, and supporting students through the re-enrollment and graduation processes.
“We have about 7,000 students who have attended, but never received their degree,” Gillette said. “They have a way of reaching out to see if those people want to come back and complete a degree. We have had a lot of people respond to that. We will have some of those students come back and complete those degrees.”
LSSU will be offering microcredentials to help people in the area develop new, employable skills.
The university is also in the process of hiring a swim and dive coach.
“Ultimately, that may mean about 65 additional students on those teams,” Gillette said.
In the meantime, LSSU administration awaits HLC approval for a new Masters of Business Administration (MBA) degree.
“The earliest we would start would be August of 2024,” Gillette said. “We believe it will be a good draw for students. We are looking very much at a graduate degree in fisheries and wildlife.”
When Gillette finished presenting LSSU updates and news to city commissioners and the general public, Commissioner Andrew Rubinstein spoke up.
“As an employee of Lake Superior State University and commissioner, thank you for coming out to speak. The relationship between the city of Sault Ste. Marie and the university is absolutely critical.”
