Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: We're back. Senator Education Committee. What's the date? Sixteenth, sixteenth. And today, this afternoon, we have Doctor. Elizabeth Locke with us, the chancellor of the Montpellier State College of System, to, have, actually, no, we have 50 here at least once a year, this is the 2026 visit, just for some level of update and we're talking about strategic plan. You were here, well, we'll go around the room anyway, so you probably know everybody.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yeah, I do.

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Okay. You know what, we'll wait and we'll skip it because people watching have seen us do it now. See you today so we don't do it again. Okay, well, with that, Just your name for the record and off we go. Sure.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: I'm Beth Mau, Chancellor of the Vermont Psychologist System. I want to thank you all for having me here today. It is always a pleasure to be here and talk to the Senate Ed Committee. Pleasure to be here just to tell everybody that the State House has come alive and it's nice to be back in the building. I always like to ground us as I'm starting in our mission for the Vermont State Holiday System, and that is for the benefit of Vermont. So we were established by the legislature for the benefit of Vermont. And what that means for us is that we know that we have to ensure that every Vermonter has access to high quality, higher education, regardless of their income or their location, and that we have to be that trusted partner for them throughout their lifetime as their need for higher education ebbs and flows. I'm here today really with great news. The system is thriving. We are about 83% Vermonters. As a reminder, the Vermont State College system is comprised of Vermont State University and the Community College of Vermont. When you put all of our students together, about 83% of them are Vermonters. Overall, our enrollment was up about 1.4% this year, but in that 10% of our online we were up 10% in our online enrollment, which is a real marker for us and something that we're very proud to ensure that that helps us to serve more Vermonters. And then several real key programs for us were up very high in enrollment. So things like elementary education, mechanical engineering, a lot of our health sciences programs were also up in enrollment. Really do believe that we are one of the key workforce drivers in the state, so when we have programs like that that are really taking off, it's a point of pride for us. The other thing that I'd just like to mention is that I'm just so proud to be here in Vermont and just so proud to work with this legislature and committees like yours. Know, hiring has been under attack. People usually ask me, hey, what's going on? And I always tell them, I'm just so happy to be here in Vermont, where our legislature really understands higher education, that you have worked with us hand in hand to make sure that we are educating the students of Vermont. And I was really proud earlier in the fall, Senator Lyons came to me to talk about a bill she's looking at to promote and have the legislature support academic freedom. And that's really exciting to me, that we really have trust in our faculty to guide our students through what sometimes can be difficult conversations. It's just one of the things that really makes me happy here in Vermont. Oh, sure, yes.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Can I

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: ask a few questions?

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I'm curious regarding the enrollment, if you know what that's attributed to. The increase is great, but any ideas why? Why? Yeah, why are we seeing more? What's encouraging people to enroll in the system?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Well, one of the things I was gonna talk about later has certainly been a program by the legislature called both the eight zero two Opportunity, which is for free community college at the Community College of Vermont, for any household in Vermont that's making $100,000 or less, and the Freedom Immunity Program, which we've started in collaboration with VSAC, which is for Vermont State University that allows any family whose income is $65,000 or less to come to Vermont State University. The reason these programs are so important is one of the things we know is that sort of those last couple of dollars are sometimes the thing that really holds students from being able to attend college. And when we have programs like that that allow families to participate in college and their students and the learners. That allows them to not only come to college, but be very routine at college. So certainly as those programs have come more online and as we have gotten out the messaging for those, that is one of the biggest drivers for why we're noticing some of these enrollments. The online piece of that's interesting because oftentimes online students aren't necessarily coming full time and so it allows them to say, I can try this, I have my expenses covered, and then I can see how it is I'm gonna actually do college. I would say that's probably one of the attributes. We have worked really hard on the programs that we have so that they are meeting the needs of Vermonters. Looking at, okay, what are the programs that we are offering that make sense for workforce? What are the programs that we're offering that make sense for when you're in a position to be able to get them to go on to another position? So we've really looked and tried to see how are we meeting the needs of Vermonters, and so those are

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: just two examples of it. Awesome, thank you. So

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: one of the things that I did want to talk a little bit about though is the changing demographic. So we know in Vermont that we are an older state, keep getting older, and what that means for us is that there are fewer 18 year olds, which is a very well known piece, And that's not just here in Vermont, that is all over the Northeast. And so as we look at this and when I'm talking to folks, what that has also meant for us is that our demographics at the Vermont State College System are also different. So What I usually like to talk to folks about is the fact that our students are older than you might think. While we do still have a very robust traditional age population, we also have students who in our part time areas, as example, are nearly 30. They are looking for more flexibility. They are looking to have college wrap around their lives as opposed to their lives wrapped around college. So, that has been something that we know we have had to be making changes as we've done that. One of the pieces has been those online opportunities and online totally creates synchronous. So, if you are out in the community and you have a position, it's not always the case that you can take a class at a prescribed time. And we know that that has been one of the things that we've really been working on to make sure that we're meeting the needs of those Vermonters. And we know that this will continue to be something that we have to work on as more folks are getting into education who need to upskill and get more training, or folks who are, as I said, in a workplace situation where they would like to maybe even go to some other institution. As we look at working with folks here in Department of Labor and the Agency of Education, what kinds of physicians do we need to start looking at and what kinds of majors do we have to have so that we're ensuring we're meeting those needs. And then looking at things like micro credentials or other apprenticeship models that do allow folks to stay in the position that they have and upskill as they're doing that. Now, as we are talking about this and as I mentioned that the demographics are changing, the other thing that we have been working on is really revitalizing and ensuring that our campuses, especially at Vermont State University, remain vibrant. So as we know the demographics are changing and that we don't always have students who are looking to come to our campuses, stay on our campuses, we have to make sure that we are really meeting the needs of the communities in which we live and can able be stewards of our resources. So I have some examples for you today of some of the things that we're starting to see. I'll start with the Johnson Campus. So we are really excited that Down Street received one of the disaster relief grants and what we're gonna be doing is bringing senior housing to the McClellan Building on the Johnson Campus. Now the results of those grants were really important for us because we were starting to talk to folks and say, you know, we wanna make sure that we are being a community steward for you. And so, in addition to that, we also will have very soon, probably by the end of the spring semester, have the Johnson Health Clinic come up with and talks with them. That will be so important because it will allow our students to have more access to healthcare. It will allow students to have opportunities to have some internships that they can potentially do. And it really will help us to look at the vibrancy of the campus. In addition to that, there have been a number of other folks who have come forward and have said, we would really like to look at some of your campus facilities to see if we can come on and really start to look at the community that is Johnson's. At the same time, on our Linden campus, we've been in conversations with Kingdome East School District, who has a need for some administrative offices, and so we've been looking at partnering with them. Does they have to bring them onto our campus so that they can conduct their business? The exciting thing for us about that, and while they're administrative offices, what that does for us is it really starts to get us to say, there's more students, K-twelve students, who will start to know more about our Linden campus. So that's a really exciting opportunity. And as I said, there are a number of other opportunities. One of the other things I wanted to talk to you about was what seems to me to be sort of the key components to all of this really is workforce housing. Because we have a number of employers saying, you know, we have this workforce, we're a little bit concerned about where we might be able to place these folks. For us, those conversations actually have been turning into from workforce housing, where they may be able to use some of our facilities for that, into opportunities to train folks in their communities and in these opportunities to have the folks who are coming onto our campuses maybe have their families also participate. So we're very excited about some of the opportunities that are happening on our campuses. The other thing that we are looking to do is partner with businesses which we've obviously done since we were founded. But a couple of really exciting programs I'd like to talk about. One is the CPAP program. What that allows, so not everybody goes to college right away and sometimes as you're starting to realize, I might need some training, this program's really nice. It allows students to come in to maybe take some courses at the same time they're working with regional businesses to see what kind of position they may be really interested in. It really takes folks from maybe not having the skills that they need to giving them the beginning skills that they need, all the while they're taking four credit courses so that if they need even more upskilling they've got a basis of credits and they start to see what they can do

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: in college. Is that like almost an adult CTE? You know, that comes in and they get to experience the workforce that they want to get into?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yeah, a little bit. Even though more opportunities than even just maybe a CTE, but yes, they're having these opportunities to both learn and work at a business at the same time.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: And if you don't mind me asking, in the Johnson and Linda, how many students now are in those campuses? I do not have

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: those numbers right off the top of my head. We'll have to get those to you. Sorry about that. And, you know, I'm a mathematician, I guess. I won't get close for you.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: And we

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: also have, as we have really been touting the plumbing and electrical apprenticeships at what was Vermont Technical College and at Vermont State University. And in addition, we have looked at other sort of innovative models. So we know that we have welcomed a number of new Americans to Vermont and sometimes they are some of our best employees. They may not have the English skills in order to get some of those positions immediately. And so what we are very excited about is the English course that we have for folks who are interested in STEM related subjects. So we're just constantly trying to look and see how is it that we're meeting the needs of the state and making sure that we're doing those and keeping up with those as quickly as we possibly can. A lot of times this is about not only getting the right programs but getting

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: the right programs in a timely fashion.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: So our budget request for this year, first of all, we will be asking for an additional 3% on our base budget as we do with which will get us to $54,425,753 The important thing to note this year is we are not requesting bridge funding anymore, so this is our first year for FY '27 where we're not going to be requesting bridge funding. Very excited about that. But thank the legislature for the support that you've given us over the years. We're secondly asking for $1,500,000 for workforce micro credentials, which I'm gonna describe in just a little bit, so I'll hold on that. A third request that we made was for a combination of 4,200,000 for allied health. So this has been something that we have received over the last many, many years. What that helps us to do is to pay for our faculty for some clinical support and training for our students Because we have been increasing the number of nurses and respiratory therapists and dental hygienists that we have over the years, we're asking for more funding to help us pay for those additional costs that we have. And then in addition, we're asking as part of the capital request to have a million dollars. So one of the things as we have started to really look at our facilities footprint has been what are some different kinds of housing that we might be able to put on our campuses that make sense. So I talked about workforce housing, but one of the things sometimes families need are apartments and our traditional dorms don't always meet those needs. And so what we're looking to do is to get plans and development and maybe do some site work in order to be able to go to a developer who could then perhaps work with us to put in an apartment building, especially on the Johnson campus. Really the apartment building could go on any one of our campuses. Just trying to show you the variety of ways that we're looking to try to transform these campuses so that they are meeting the needs of our students, but the community at the same time. So that is a bunch of requests. As I mentioned, the workforce micro credentialing that we're talking about, we've done this for many, many years, plumbing and electrical, the nursing program really is one of those. One of the examples that I'm really excited about this year that we've been working on is education, an elementary education program where we're looking to have that be in the same type of thing as an apprenticeship where we have folks who might start working in our school districts who might be interested in actually becoming teachers. Here again, they don't have time to take these classes at the end of the day. And they're getting an awful lot of experience in the schools. So we've partnered with the Agency on Education and the Department of Labor to look at how we're going to start a program for teachers that includes an apprenticeships. The funny for them

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Sorry to disrupt the train of thought again here. I'm looking at the bullet point with retain and attracts talented promoters, and it sounds like you're attracting people to come and participate in all sorts of the programs. Do you have any measure of how many people are being retained? Like after they graduate, are they sticking around, are they going elsewhere?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: We do in certain programs. We are actually working right now with the Department of Labor and some national groups to try to get more data even, but we do have data from several programs. So, nursing, and I'll give you that one because we just recently, I think this week sometime, got the NCLEX report from nursing. So, that's the test that our nursing students have to take when they are finished with their program. At this point, every one of our nursing programs has an excess of a ninety percent pass rate. Many of our programs have 100% pass rates, so the different programs are an LPN program, an APN program, maybe a BSN program. There are different NCLEX tests for all of those. Of those students that have taken the test, more than ninety percent of those have taken their test in the state of Vermont We know them and they are staying in Vermont. That is the kind of data that we have on very prescribed programs. One of the things that we are looking to partner with the Department of Labor on is how do we get these same kinds of information for more of our programs. We actually are just in the beginning of able to capture that data and tying it to our students. So we can tell for sure that more of them are even staying in the state of Vermont. With these apprenticeship programs we do know for the plumbing and electrical apprenticeships here, again, we know that more than 90% of those stay in the state and are located in the state. For the programs that you know, they're very high percent of the state.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: Great, thank you. I had some dentists reach out to me about the dental hygiene assessment and how Vermont does a pretty good job. Don't know, like, 23 students. It's a very low number that we have to go through. One of the concerns they voice was, I guess they got a grant, a block grant or something, and maybe the money couldn't have been used for this so I could speak on it, but he's like, rather than putting a, I guess you have to have professional dentists to come in and help during the course of this, and finding them has been a chore, He There was a bunch of Why they couldn't use some of that money rather than upgrading a facility or building a brand new facility, I thought he said. Put more money in attracting dentists to come to help get our dentists, hygienist better trained or even add more because I guess it's a highly sought after and we need to do a better job in high school to get, say, here's of, then you

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: can go two years and make real good money.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: What I say to him on your behalf? If you even know I get that far in the leads.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: I I know. Several things. So we did receive a congressionally directed spending grant from Senator Walsh's office to try to expand that program. So you're in a process right now that will include some amount of filled out because as you can imagine, there just are space needs for dental hygienist programs. So, we're in the process of working on that so that we can extend the number of dental hygienists. We know that this is one of the challenges that we do only have 24 seats right now, so we'll be working on that. In addition, one of the other pieces we've been working on in the state has been sometimes students come in, they think, well, might want to be a dental hygienist, but I might also want to be something else. And so, CCV has actually a pre health program where we can put students in a number of programs so that they can start see if they like it. It also allows them to get some of those prerequisites that courses that sometimes students need. And when we are looking to develop something like that, also for the dental hygienist program, so that students first have a chance to see what they want

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: to do. But we think that that will also help our students be more successful as they get into that dental hygiene program. And do you work CTEs to say, here could be another career field we should start trying to emphasize in CTEs, If you do have a student, is there a way, because they probably can't do it at any CTE school, is there a way that students could get to the Vermont State course? Is there any facilitation for that? Or is that just to get them to see if they'd like the career field?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yes, as I said, CCB specifically has sort of a pre health track where students can both see what they're interested in for health programs, but also get some of those pre reqs that we know

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: that this is. That's what the CTE should probably push those students. Is there communication between that and that?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: We communicate with the CTEs quite a lot. I know I've met with the directors of CTs just to give them a broad overview of all of the programs that we have. So we do try

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: to keep those communication lines open. Thanks.

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: So that's a popular program going through seats or slots. What's keeping you from expanding into those 16?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: We're in the process of so the funds from Senator Walsh should allow us to ultimately double the program over the next several years. What we'll probably do is build it up slowly. A space is the space. Space in which campus is this located? Williston. Williston. The other thing we'll need is also faculty teaching that program so that's another part of that for the plan that we'll meet down by Genesis faculty.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: So do you have an instructor shortage, a dentist shortage? You may want to reach out to the interstate compact. We've been doing a lot

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: of work with them. We are helping all for

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: a period of Thank you. Yeah. We had some.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: So, just also one of the things that I'd like to mention again, I know we talked about this at the beginning, is I do want to thank all of you for your support of both the eight zero two Opportunity and Freedom and Unity program. One of the things we're trying to do is make sure that every family who has a student or has learned wants to go to college and participate in those programs. So we are looking and supporting VSAC this year and an increase in their request of their one time funds from last year to try to increase that threshold for students at BTSU. One of the things I've had students tell me, Hey, I've got two years at CCV and now I'd like to go to BTSU, but because I'm in that gap, I can't afford to go to college anymore. So we wanna just make sure that every family has that opportunity. So we're really excited to support ESAC in that request. And then in addition, I just wanted to talk a little bit about some of the flexible pathways for students in high school to get to college. So one of the things we know is that sometimes seeing what their opportunities are to go to college is important. And there are a number of programs in the state that we have that are supported by the legislature or that can be paid for that we're very excited about. So students have opportunities to do dual enrollment. So, dual enrollment is a program where a student is still at their high school and can take some college courses. There's an early college program which allows students to fully take courses for their senior year, has been very exciting. We have the Fast Forward program, which is a direct collaboration with CTEs in the state. Students who are in a CTE have opportunities to take specialized courses in a field that they would like to go into. That's very exciting. And then finally, the VAST program, which has been out of our traditional, our brand off campus, which really allows students to get preparation in the STEM disciplines. We've been excited about that. We also did receive a grant for a bridge program that powers that so that we can try to recruit those students into ETSU. So,

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: I'll go ahead.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Okay, I'll ask. So fast forward, are these university students going back to the CTE or are these? There are

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: CTE students who are taking college courses at their campus and so typically what happens in that program is that the CTE has a specialty in something. So one of the things I was taught to the CTEs about was their Ag programs and maybe a forestry program. So perhaps there's a forestry program at that CTE. What they will do is they will take the students who are interested in that, they will find a college level course that those students can take at the CTE, and then the students take that typically from one of the teachers that is in the school.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Yeah, so confused. The CTE, in my mind CTE is still in high school.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: It is, yes.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: So we're not talking about Johnson with the undergrad level CTE.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Right, so no, this would be a student who's still in high school who has a special interest, but what happens is those courses are actually taking place at the CTE, and they're usually typically taught by a high school teacher that's in the school. They are our courses and so what students will get is they will get a credit either from CCV or VTSU. There are other colleges that participate in this as well. So the students can get college level credit for a program that they are interested in taking. Well, I just have one thing to look at. Last slide is this lovely thing which almost brought me to tears. So I love going to graduation every year. This was a woman who brought her child across this stage as she graduated. And this is just one example. I think this happened at every one of the graduations that we had where parents were bringing their children across the stage as they were graduating. It freaks me up every time. Just think it's so important for us to understand just how transformative these programs are and these majors are for families and for folks, so that parents can show their children, This is what I did. Really, the heart of everything that we do, really, we just have one simple goal. As I said, we just want to make sure that we make it possible for all Vermonters to have opportunities for higher education of all ages and all backgrounds. What we believe that that will do is that it's gonna lead these folks to more opportunities so that they can really meet their person. Purpose. Purpose. Because when public colleges succeed, really Vermont learners are succeeding. And when Vermont learners are succeeding, really those communities that they are living in thrive. This really is at the heart of the matter of why I do what I do, why I'm so excited to do what I do, and why I'm so excited to really work for all of you. So I want to thank you all for everything and I'm happy to take any more questions if you have them.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Go ahead. We've got a few of my friends. Okay. So I appreciate your overview. It's always nice to see you and whatever's going on with state of college systems. So in one of your slides, showed you indicated a growth in education of 58%. Oh, a program. Yeah. A particular program. Health sciences, 26% of mechanical engineering. But the attendance numbers are still relatively flat. So if those are going up, what programs are going down? Like what programs do you see receding that you're contemplating, well, do we shored up or do we cut?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: So every year we do a review of our programs with our faculty to see what are the programs that we might need to make adjustments to. This is just normal in higher ed. It's really just quality improvement and continuous quality improvement. Let me tell you about some of the examples of things that we have done where maybe the numbers are down, but rather than closing the program we're looking at how can we redo the program. One of the programs in this year's program array that we have noticed that the numbers are down is both in our auto mechanic program and our diesel mechanic programs which are both on a granular campus. If you looked at the straight numbers you could say, you know what, these are programs that we have to close. Rather than doing that I actually asked our workforce folks to look at this. The woman who is in that program, for the workforce is most recently from Wisconsin. She said, I think there's something in Wisconsin that's similar to this. So what we have done is reached out to some of the CTEs. We've reached out to the Department of Labor and what we think we can do is change the way that we are teaching those courses so that they are more accessible to folks. So once again, when I'm talking about online options, rather than having all the students have a requirement to maybe come to the Randolph campus, are there ways that we can look at putting some of these programs up online, and at the same time, perhaps you know of someone who has an auto or diesel shop that needs this, and so looking at making that into apprenticeship model. So, that's one of the ways that we're really looking at this. So, sometimes when we look at these program arrays and we say, wow, those numbers are low, what are ways that we can do things differently? You know, there's always going to be some programs where we look at them and we say, you know, the numbers just aren't there. A lot of times what we've done is potentially maybe diluted the pool a little bit too much. Maybe in a major there are a number of certificates or concentrations where the numbers aren't quite so good. The challenge with something like that when we have programs like that is that then you don't have so many students in some of the upper level courses. So, what we have looked at doing is taking those programs and those courses and saying, okay, rather than having six of these kinds of concentrations, let's lower the numbers and look at how we can find things so that we have more students at the upper level courses. We work very closely with the faculty. Then sometimes just combining different programs. So we're trying to be creative in how we look at the program array so that we're still meeting the needs of Vermont, but doing it in a more economical way. So that's been some of the goals of

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: what we've done. Great, thank you.

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: I just want to make sure that as we're Going back to the budget request, I just want make sure I have it down. Okay. So 3% increased the base.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: Yes. Number two?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Was the micro credential workforce at $1,500,000 and we can come back to you once we know what the governor's budget says for these. That's the program where I would look to be generalizing the kinds of micro credentials, apprenticeships that we have around the state, just seeing how we can do that, ramping up some of the curriculum for all of that. Okay. There is the Global Commitment for Allied Health. I think you have to add the two numbers together, but in total we would be having an increased asset to $4,200,000 I believe. Global, explain the whole thing. I'm gonna have Sharon just explain.

[Sharron Scott, CFO/COO, Vermont State Colleges System]: So the Vermont State Colleges for many years has received some funds from essentially Medicaid dollars, global commitment, that have supported our allied health programs that specifically for nursing, dental hygiene, respiratory therapy, etcetera. Those funds come to us as largely grant funds, so largely not as part of your general fund, and then a small portion of your general fund. And so what Chancellor Malka is recommending is an increase of little more than $2,400,000 that would increase that to support the allied health programs and the direct expenses that underwrite those allied health programs due to the the large costs associated with running those and the the large number of students that the Vermont State College tries to make sure that we

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: put out at an affordable rate.

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: And did you lose some federal funding or is this just

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: to add? This is just to add that we've lost no funding. We just know that we're now training more nurses, more respiratory therapists, and so it's an increase for that reason.

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: Thank you. It would be helpful, I think, if you could put that in the letter to us. Sure. With that kind of description for what it is so that we Yes, we

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: have that.

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: To the extent we recommend to the appropriate patient, we can actually

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: build the parking and

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: make sure we're clear about the parking lot. Yes, certainly.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yes. Then the last is the million dollars for the apartment complex. The development of

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: plans for an apartment complex may get like John. So that's the help with soft costs?

[Sen. Nader Hashim (Member)]: Yeah, yes. So that's the development cost. New construction or renovation of current?

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: You know, it'd new construction. One of the things we looked at was residence halls of height of those don't really make sense, but rather than tearing those down, our thought is we can put one of these apartment buildings on a parking lot so we're not worried about pervious coverage, actually, like the pervious And coverage then having apartments, reason for Johnson is we actually already have apartments up on Johnson and those are full, so we know that there is a demand for those, both for our students and potentially for the community. But at the same time it does allow us to see if there is some kind of market also for those residence halls, the traditional residence halls right now so that's what we're looking to do.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Yeah. If we could, so we acknowledge that your enrollment is slightly up 4.1% growth, but you've got several campuses. One of our concerns has been and has been for this is now the fourth year, each individual campus enrollment numbers as a trend line would be very valuable to us just to kind of sense is everything okay or is there an underwritten call? Doctor. Doug is very helpful, but I think we've been asking for that.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: I think we have it watched. I will get back to you again, but sure. One of the things just to note is that as we're talking about the overall number being up, that does include these students who are coming to us from online. And so, the enrollment being up is an overall increase. I think on the slide that I had, we know that it was up at Williston and Linden this year. But the real enrollment, what's bolstering that up is significant increases in online enrollment that we're even seeing right now. Some of the Freedom and Unity funds, as we're getting into January, classes start Tuesday, students are enrolling in these totally online programs. Been really an amazing thing. Here again, we know that we've got to change the way that we are thinking about how we're meeting the needs of those students. There's just

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: a lot of other operational pieces to this that we haven't traditionally done in traditional higher eds. Okay, that's just one kind of a challenging question. So there is a bell about educational freedom,

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: has already hit the string. I'd like you to react to the concept that this all money coming from the state treasury, we're providing education for students but we're not prioritizing what they applied this money or their academic efforts towards. But we do know from an economic development sense what professions we need in Vermont that are not being fulfilled. And I'm wondering what your perspective is on, if you're willing to, why we don't target or prioritize those scholarships towards jobs that we need.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: I think that's a fair question. The reason for me is that we, one of the things we can certainly do is continue to develop our program array so that we are creating those programs that students need, that the economy really needs in Vermont. The challenge with only funding certain types of programs is that you are really tunneling folks in. So, of the things that we really want to make sure we're doing is ensuring that everybody finds what it is they're good at. So what we have found is that when we have these kinds of programs where it's for just one type of thing, we're not really opening up that funnel. And so a lot of what a lot needs is just more students coming in and looking at programs and looking at majors and so we think

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: that's something that's very important.

[Sen. David Weeks (Vice Chair)]: Do you think there's a difference between whether the student is paying for it themselves or whether the state is paying for it on their behalf and whether they should be allowed to pursue whatever it is that they're interested in pursuing or

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: suitable I to say think that we want to leave it open. I think that we want to leave it open for more students to have opportunities to decide what it is, which programs they think that are best suited for themselves so that we're not narrowing our own, we're not upfront deciding it's only these programs and then not having students even come into a college setting. One of the parts of college really is, one of the pieces of college is kind of discovering what you're good at, what you might want to do, and so when we start to say it's just these majors, we don't always see that that's what the outcome is. So yes, I think that we should have this as open to a positive major. Thank

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: you. I think, by the way, what you're doing with trying to bring housing on your campuses with available spaces. Are you doing that with intentionality? Are you to, like, sort of also not just have housing for the sake of housing, but integrate it into the community life? I'm I'm sorry. The college life.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yes, so this has all been, as a matter of as we started to talk about this, we

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: I assume the answer is yes.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yeah, we've had folks interested in using our facilities, using the gyms that are there, what about the cafeterias? So, that has been part of what we've done. As I said, this notion of workforce housing has been very interesting. It almost seems like at the heart of what it

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: is we're trying to do. Yes. That being said, building that, so that becomes state housing that people pay for? Or is it gonna be a private entity coming in and building and maintaining and? We are looking at all options. Certainly public private partnerships are one option. Looking at it, We still own the land at this point, so, you know, we're trying to look at all options to see how we can do this.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: We, you, Riley, don't have all our funds to-

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: So that million dollars is to do that study as well, which would be the best option for the state because, yeah. Yeah. I'd have some concerns, let's just say it's different different. Alright. Thank you.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Thank you

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: very Yeah. Was nice to see you.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: Yes. It was good to see all

[Sen. Steven Heffernan (Member)]: of you. So we'll look for that to

[Sen. Seth Bongartz (Chair)]: help us look into our budget letter.

[Dr. Elizabeth "Beth" Mauch, Chancellor, Vermont State Colleges System]: I will get that. Okay. Thank you. Good.