The facts, and they are facts, that WV has both too few educated people (or, put a better way, a hostile business climate towards job creators that means many educated people have to GTFO ASAP) and too many state colleges are not contradictory.
We don't have enough people with educations.
We have way too many state colleges.
May be true, SamC, but just look at what WVU is doing, or planning to. vis-a-vis its moves in southern WV. They have, or plan to have, the jackass hick county commissions in both Kanawha and Fayette counties to NOT SUE over the planned relocation of WV TECH to Beckley!! On one hand, WVU (Gee) tells Fayette officials that they will maintain, maybe even renovate, some Tech facilities in Montgomery to try and find uses for them to help the economy in that area of Fayette County. On the other hand, WVU Tech will move its programs, etc., to UC Beckley (formerly Mountain State U.) campus in Beckley, which will also require some remodeling, renovations, upgrades, etc. In other words, both Beckley and Montgomery will require some serious CAPITAL $$$$$$$ to carry out WVU's "expansion" plans into Beckley. Where does this money come from? Why the State, of course!!!
So WVU, which already gobbles up an unfair amount of higher education capital dollars in this state, will use state monies, via bonding, to carry out its plans. Meanwhile, MU, which has nearly 400 million dollars of planned renovations, new academic, recreation and athletic facilities, etc., on the drawing boards in its approved Master Plan, just waits while said plans are "gathering dust". The blatant truth, to the detriment of higher education overall in WV, is that neither MU nor any other state college or university, aside from WVU, has the ability to issue capital bonds without further approval from Charleston, the legislature, etc. On the other hand, WVU's board of governors has virtual carte blanche to issue such bonds at any time WITHOUT further state approval. That's why they have constant construction going on and can get projects going in a relative short period of time. Meanwhile, on the Huntington campus, the "silence is deafening".
So while facilities in college campuses statewide continue to deteriorate or become obsolete, outside of Morgantown, there, the construction boom continues unabated. Its easy to close campuses, like WVU Tech, where the campus was allowed to deteriorate and the enrollment, as a result, declined. Then WVU rushes in, makes the move to Beckley, like a white knight savior. Who's next in Gee's power/campus grab? Concord? Bluefield State? WV State? MU?
Want a stark comparison to the above pathetic state of our colleges and universities, aside from WVU? WV State just lost their president, Dr. Hemphill, to Radford University, a school of about 9,000 students in Virginia. At Radford, Hemphill's predecessor, who was there for about the same time as Dr. Kopp was at MU, oversaw over $400 million in capital construction at the during her tenure. Folks, I doubt seriously if during the same time period that there was $400 million in capital construction in ALL OF THE STATE COLLEGE CAMPUSES IN WV OUTSIDE OF MORGANTOWN!!!
MU alums, supporters, fans and administration, as well as the Huntington area population as a whole, had better wake up and realize just what really is going on, and being planned by the Morganhole school and their Charleston political cronies, as to the current status of, and future plans for, the state's entire higher education system!!!
