Kevin O’Connor Kommentary November 19

Texas A&M’s President Makes Decisions From His Capacity And Student Experience Studies

Those attending the Bryan/College Station chamber of commerce economic outlook conference heard some of the decisions made by Texas A&M’s president from his capacity and student experience studies. An overview given by the president’s chief of staff, Susan Ballabina, included the previously announced freeze on undergraduate enrollment is expected to last between five and seven years. There will also be a ten year enrollment forecast. Dr. Ballabina said the president wants to add to on-campus housing, at least 2,500 beds. Ballabina says initiatives involving A&M’s west campus includes setting new class times and doing a comprehensive master plan. Another initiative is improving mobility and safety around the flagship campus, which includes the purchase of eight of ten new buses. Click below to hear Susan Ballabina’s comments during the chamber’s economic outlook conference on January 22, 2025: Listen to “Texas A&M's president makes decisions from his capacity and student experience studies” on Spreaker. Click HERE to be directed to the Texas A&M president’s website, which includes links to access additional information. Click HERE to be read and download president Mark Welsh’s statement that was issued January 23, 2025: As you know, the demand for a Texas A&M University degree continues to grow. In fact, our student body has grown more than 30% over the last 10 years, which is more than double the average of all other public universities in the state. This massive growth is due in large part to the outstanding student education and experience that our amazing faculty and staff provide to our exceptional students. Collectively, we absorbed much of the impact of this growth over the last 10 years, but as I’ve said before, we cannot continue to do that. We must right-size our university in the near-term to ensure we maintain an incredible education and experience for our students over the long-term. In the spring and summer of 2024, we conducted two studies – the Student Experience and the Capacity Studies – to help us better understand the impact of our growth and to ensure that when our students leave Texas A&M, they look back as fondly on their experience here as the generations before them. The Capacity Study Committee reviewed the current infrastructure, teaching capacities and staffing levels to identify the current and future enrollment capacity on the main campus, as well as any near-term adjustments required to better serve the entire university community. The Student Experience Study Committee documented the current student experience to establish the standard necessary to offer the nation’s #1 student experience. I’m grateful to the committee members for their extensive work and to all of you who took time to share your input on the initial recommendations several months ago. The committee adjusted their recommendations based on your feedback, and I spent the last few weeks of December and early January discussing the final recommendations with university leadership. Today, I’m pleased to share the final reports and my decisions resulting from both the Student Experience Study and Capacity Study. As expected, there was natural overlap within the two studies, and we will move forward implementing recommendations from both to position Texas A&M for continued leadership in higher education for decades to come. A comprehensive list of all decisions for both reports, prioritized by deadline, can also be found here. There are several decisions I want to explicitly highlight from both studies: Enrollment: We plan to pause undergraduate growth on the main campus over the next five to seven years, while allowing graduate, online and locations outside Bryan-College Station to continue to grow at modest rates. Pausing enrollment growth on main campus (keeping the total number of new undergraduates each year to 15,000) for a period of time will give us time to build the infrastructure and capacity we need now and in the future. We will also develop a 10-year enrollment forecast to plan further into the future. I plan to discuss our recommended plans for enrollment with The Texas A&M University System Board of Regents in the near future. Mobility: University growth has resulted in transit- and parking-related issues for faculty, staff and students. To help address this issue, we will acquire an additional 8-10 new buses, consider later class start times on West Campus and engage with the local community and transportation agencies on safe connections to campus. We will develop a plan to separate pedestrian traffic from wheeled devices (bikes and personal electric vehicles) on major sidewalks across campus, enhance existing regulations on use of sidewalks, improve enforcement of rules and continue efforts to raise awareness of expectations on shared use of campus sidewalks and thoroughfares. Infrastructure: We will develop proposals for related infrastructure updates and new facilities including additional classroom, research, office and dining spaces. Faculty/Staff Support: We will assess new faculty lines and project required funding over the next five years and will invest up to $3 million annually for new faculty salaries and benefits over that five-year period. We will also take a close look at high-demand services to ensure appropriate funding. These include, but are not limited to, Disability Resources, Career Center, Student Life and Academic Success Center, and Academic Advising. Student Support and Experience: Considering 30% of our students’ academic home is now on West Campus, improvements to infrastructure and amenities are vital. We will create a West Campus development plan that includes additional on-campus housing, dining, recreational spaces, study spaces, parking, classroom spaces and faculty offices. Additionally, given that our current on-campus housing capacity is 20% of our undergraduate student body, we will develop a plan to add a minimum of 2,500 additional beds in on-campus housing. We will review the academic calendar and decompress the period between semesters to allow orientation and onboarding for new students to be done in the best way possible. We will develop more robust policies and processes for the adoption of course materials, homework systems, learning management tools and other course resources that students must pay for above required tuition and fees, including a […]

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