Bluefield State College Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

BSU Faculty Senate Votes ‘No Confidence’ In President, University Officials

The Faculty Senate at Bluefield State University has passed a vote of no confidence in Bluefield State University President Robin Capehart, the Bluefield State University Board of Governors, and Executive Vice President and General Counsel Brent Benjamin.

This is a developing story and may be updated.

The vote alleged numerous violations of West Virginia state codes, state higher ed policies, and accreditation criteria concerning communication, administrative procedure, tenure, and shared governance including:

The unsanctioned administrative dissolution of the faculty senate
The elimination of tenure and tenure protections
The elimination of peer review for tenure and promotion
The elimination of required faculty peer review of courses, curricula, and academic hires
The denial/nullification of democratically elected senate officers
The dissolution of the Office and absence of an Officer for Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion
Elimination of the protections required for academic freedom and freedom of speech
Creation of a toxic and authoritarian work environment harming institutional effectiveness

The votes were held on two different dates. The initial vote by the faculty senate was on Oct. 28. Each vote passed overwhelmingly. From Nov. 1 to 2, the full faculty voted on the same resolutions.

The vote against Capehart passed 37 to 8 with 5 no votes.

The vote against the board of governors passed 37 to 7 with 6 no votes.

The vote against Benjamin passed 39 to 7 with 4 no votes.

In a phone call, Charlie Cole, the chairman of the Board of Governors, said none of the faculty senate’s legal arguments hold water and he said general counsel Benjamin agreed. For Cole, the faculty senate was upset with two things.

“First, we added a post-tenure review,” he said. “Every three years, a tenured professor has to demonstrate that they are being the best professor they can be.”

The second change was that the faculty senate was changed to a faculty assembly. Cole said the board felt that was more inclusive by allowing adjunct and visiting faculty to participate.

“We want more input, not less,” he said.

“I don’t want to diminish their feelings, but we knew how they felt when we voted and we still voted to pass the changes,” Cole said. He noted that the only person to vote against the changes to the faculty senate was the faculty representative.

W.Va.’s Higher Ed Leaders Approve New Nursing Programs At Concord, Glenville And University Status For Bluefield State

The West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission on Thursday approved two new Bachelor of Science in Nursing programs for Concord University and Glenville State University.

Gov. Jim Justice in December announced the West Virginia Nursing Workforce Expansion Program, which aims to address the ongoing nursing shortage. He said in that press briefing that the state has seen 1,700 nurses leave the field, and it’s been compounded by the stress of the coronavirus pandemic.

But the hope is the expansion program will change this trend.

The West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission on Thursday approved two new Bachelor of Science in Nursing programs for Concord University and Glenville State University.

“We are tremendously grateful to Gov. Justice for providing this historic funding to support the expansion of nursing education programs across West Virginia,” said Sarah Armstrong Tucker, West Virginia’s chancellor of higher education. “Through these new projects, our postsecondary education community will be better positioned to help shore up West Virginia’s nursing workforce, which, in turn, will help support our nurses working tirelessly on the front lines right now.”

The two new programs are among 27 nursing education programs at colleges, universities, schools of nursing, and career technical education centers across West Virginia that have received a total of $25.5 million through the governor’s nursing workforce expansion.

Concord will offer its own nursing program, while Glenville will offer its BSN through a partnership with Marshall University.

Concord’s BSN will be a 120 credit-hour program and will focus on meeting rural healthcare needs to help address the shortage of registered nurses in southern West Virginia.

Glenville State University will offer an educational opportunity that is not currently available in the central part of the state.

Concord’s BSN will begin in spring 2023, while Glenville’s will begin in the fall of that same year.

The HEPC on Thursday also approved university status for Bluefield State College.

The change will not go into effect until an official change is made by the school’s board of governors and the state legislature.

The criteria for university status, according to the HEPC, include offering at least one master’s-level degree program; having an approved mission statement that provides for the offering of graduate programs; obtaining the approval of the Higher Learning Commission to offer any master’s degree program; and having at least two-thirds of its faculty holding a terminal degree.

Princeton Community Hospital, Bluefield State College Join to Help Improve Healthcare Shortage in Region

Princeton Community Hospital in Mercer County is hoping an agreement with a local college will help support more training for new nurses and address the healthcare shortage in the region.

Bluefield State College (BSC) is purchasing the former site of Bluefield Regional Medical Center (BRMC) and the surrounding 68 acres.

Bluefield State came to agreement with Princeton Community Hospital on Monday. The hospital acquired the medical center in October 2019 and has continued to offer some medical services from there.

According to a release from Bluefield State, the college plans to lease portions of the facilities to PCH. The hospital will maintain the Emergency Division and related medical services.

Bluefield State plans to expand course offerings in health science programs, and provide more student housing.

Meanwhile, just last week the West Virginia University Health System announced an agreement between Princeton Community and WVU Hospitals. The hospital entered into a management agreement and clinical affiliation with WVU Hospitals, the state’s largest health system.

It’s not clear what the WVU agreement with Princeton Community Hospital will mean for Bluefield State College.

February 21, 1895: Bluefield State College Founded

On February 21, 1895, the legislature established the Bluefield Colored Institute, which would become Bluefield State College.

In the late 1800s and early 1900s, thousands of African-Americans moved into Mercer, McDowell, Raleigh, and Fayette counties to work in the mines and for the railroads. At the time, there was a shortage of higher education opportunities for blacks in West Virginia, particularly black teachers.

Bluefield was chosen because it was the largest city in the southern coalfields and located within 100 miles of nearly three-fourths of the state’s black population. The Bluefield Colored Institute opened to students in January 1897.

The school soon became a center of African-American culture, and twice in the late ‘20s, Bluefield State’s Big Blues won national black college football championships.

After mid-century, desegregation and the region’s changing population transformed Bluefield State into more of a commuter school, with an emphasis on vocational training. During the Vietnam War, a bombing rocked the phys. ed. building, and the president ordered the dorms closed. They never reopened, ending Bluefield State’s years as a historically black residential college.

Today, Bluefield State College’s enrollment stands at nearly 1,500.

West Virginia College to Offer Certain Students Free Tuition

Eligible West Virginia students could receive free tuition at Bluefield State College this fall.

News outlets report the college announced Tuesday that over a dozen programs classified as “high-skilled, high-demand” would begin offering free tuition.

Qualifying students can be incoming, current or transferring state residents that are Pell grant eligible and have completed their Free Application for Federal Student Aid. Students must also maintain a 2.0 grade point average. Programs that will accept free tuition students include engineering, computer science, nursing, business, education and criminal justice.

College officials said more than 70% of Bluefield State’s students could be eligible.

Bluefield State’s website shows nondiscounted tuition can be almost $4,000 for residents and $7,000 for out of state students.

Bluefield State is a public, historically black college in southwestern West Virginia.

Report Urges Merging Governing Boards of 4 Colleges

A report looking at higher education in West Virginia has recommended merging the governing boards of Bluefield State College, Concord University, Glenville State College and West Virginia State University.

The report labels those four schools “medium risk to high risk” in sustainability. It says the four are “sustainable in the short-term, but their futures are uncertain.” The report recommended the move, in the short term, for Bluefield and Concord, and in the long term for Glenville and WVSU.

The document cited declining enrollment and increasing reliance on enrollment rather than state funding, plus competition for students from West Virginia and Marshall universities, according to news outlets.

The report, which includes other recommendations, was issued by the nonprofit National Center for Higher Education Management Systems.

It also lists negative effects of the state government’s decisions to separate community colleges from public four-year schools, weaken the power of the state Higher Education Policy Commission and cut higher education funding.

The recommendations include “leaving open” that Concord and Bluefield “could become a single accredited institution” and “the potential of including New River Community and Technical College within the new structure while retaining its unique mission as a community college,” the Charleston Gazette-Mail reported.

And at a time when the presidents of WVU, Marshall and Concord are to co-chair Gov. Jim Justice’s newly formed group to study the funding and sustainability of higher education, the report notes that a “major obstacle to collaboration with West Virginia University or Marshall University is a fear that the larger institutions will collaborate only out of their self-interest to stifle competition or ultimately take over the smaller institutions.”

WVU Communications Office Senior Executive Director John Bolt said Tuesday he could not respond to the report in detail.

“Nevertheless, I can say without equivocation that West Virginia University is not predatory,” he said.

Bluefield President Marsha Krotseng said it would not be appropriate to comment until reviewing the report thoroughly.

In a statement, Concord President Kendra Boggess suggested that the data in the report are accurate, but said a Bluefield/Concord consolidation is “only one potential option that should be considered.”

The report says that, “in the longer-term … all the regional institutions are at risk of failure. However, that risk varies significantly.”

Regional institutions are defined as all public four-year schools but WVU, Marshall, their branch campuses and the School of Osteopathic Medicine, in Lewisburg, according to the report.

The report said that for the institutions at highest risk, Bluefield and Concord, “the challenges are so serious that only a major restructuring will preserve postsecondary education opportunity for students in Southern West Virginia. “Implementing this restructuring will require external pressure, leadership, and on-going facilitation to mandate and implement a consolidation of academic, student and administrative capacity of the two institutions.”