Proposal aired to combine NDSU and UND!

[Bill Kiefer]

I completely support the idea that the NDUS could use more work to make it a more efficient system that fits the profile of our state. It is a bit rediculous that North Dakota has 11 public higher-ed institutions. On top of that, there are more 4 year institutions that 2 year. Add in UMary and Jamestown College and ND is way too saturated with 4 year universities. There is also no reason that we need 4 institutions offering graduate level degrees. Once again, you add in UMary's Masters program and we again have too many universitites fighting for graduate students.

I think that the state combing all colleges and universities into 1 university system was a great first step. The roundtables that were to continue to shape the system have unfortunately been extremely disappointing and inefficient. I appreciate the idea that Team North Dakota has as far as continuing to improve the university system, I just don't see how taking the 2 highest profile universities in the system and combining them without addressing any of the other issues in the system is good for ND. Why would we not want to have as many high profile, nationally ranked universities as possible?

Different ideas have been adressed numberous times in different forums such as this, the media, or in community settings, but here is my humble vision for the NDUS:

Top 100 nationally ranked graduate/research institutions:

UND

NDSU

Top ranked regional universities, undergraduate only:

Central Dakota University (Minot)

Western Dakota University (Dickinson)

2 year regional colleges:

Williston State College

Bottineau State College

Lake Region State College

Bismarck State College

Valley City State College

Mayville State College

North Dakota State College of Science

I think that every college and university in the state needs to have a better defined mission. The two year colleges would be trade/tech schools as well as feeder schools to the 4 four-year universities. Each could have a specialization beyond their general offerings of english, math, science classes and cover a broad spectrum of offerings such as diesel tech, beautician/cosmotology/ message, etc. I would like to see Wahpeton go back to its science/tech roots. Bottineau could continue to specialize in forestry, game & fish, etc. Williston and Bismarck could build on their specializations in tech/associate degrees in energy. Valley City and Mayville would cover all of your general 2 year college courses and work as a net to catch all of the transfers and drop-outs of UND/NDSU that end up going over the boarder to Minnesota to all of their 2 year colleges.

WDU (Dickinson) and CDU (Minot) would focus on undergraduate degrees and not offer any of their own graduate level courses. Each should be in the 4-5,000 enrollment range.

UND and NDSU would continue to grow and build into top 100 national universities and build up their graduate level offerings. With today's technology, UND, NDSU, WDU and CDU could all offer 4 year degrees at the 2 year colleges through such things as IVAN, online, correspondence, etc. And then UND and NDSU could also offer graduate level degrees at WDU and CDU through the same means.

I think this would really streamline the system and give better missions to all of the universities as well as be a better use of resources. There is absolutely no reason that Valley City needs to be offering a graduate degree right now!

Excellent feedback, would you like to join the Team North Dakota steering committee?

[Gothmog]

it refers to the system! The system is the NDUS system. And most of the websites that I found did not list ND has having two flagship universities because as we only have ONE university system...we can only have one UNIVERSITY that the system grew out of.....NDSU did not start out as a university, they started out as an ag school.

OK, I stand corrected the Wikipedia defintion does refer to the system growing out of the flagship campus, not individual schools.

In any case, the definition you gave still does not apply to the situation in North Dakota. Although it is the oldest school in the system, UND is not the "original campus" of the system, and the system did not grow out of UND. NDUS is a later attempt to rationalized the management of several schools that were founded and grew independently of each other. That's why it's called the "North Dakota University System" not the "University of North Dakota System."

Whether you recognize it or not, and despite the fact that it does not have a law school or a medical school, NDSU is operated, and commonly thought of, as a "Flagship University."

[siouxforeverbaby]

OK, I stand corrected the Wikipedia defintion does refer to the system growing out of the flagship campus, not individual schools.

In any case, the definition you gave still does not apply to the situation in North Dakota. Although it is the oldest school in the system, UND is not the "original campus" of the system, and the system did not grow out of UND. NDUS is a later attempt to rationalized the management of several schools that were founded and grew independently of each other. That's why it's called the "North Dakota University System" not the "University of North Dakota System."

Whether you recognize it or not, and despite the fact that it does not have a law school or a medical school, NDSU is operated, and commonly thought of, as a "Flagship University."

I know everything that you stated as history. I have studied it, as have others in my family. Second, I ask again who commonly thinks of it as one? From the websites that I could find, North Dakota has one flagship university, but I can see that we are going to disagree on this so fine I agree to disagree.

[Gothmog]

I know everything that you stated as history. I have studied it, as have others in my family. Second, I ask again who commonly thinks of it as one? From the websites that I could find, North Dakota has one flagship university, but I can see that we are going to disagree on this so fine I agree to disagree.

I think is probably true that supporters of NDSU tend to think of it as one of North Dakota's two flagship schools, while UND supporters think of UND as the only flagship school. Neither has any such official status, so it's largely a matter of opinion. Especially given the fact the the common defintion of "Flagship University" really does not apply to the situation in North Dakota.

Anyway, this disagreement does serve as an example of why Mr. Kiefer's proposal to combine the two schools would be extremely difficult to accomplish. NDSU supporters and UND supporters will argue endlessly to prevent their school (or city) from losing status relative to the other.

[Bill Kiefer]

I think is probably true that supporters of NDSU tend to think of it as one of North Dakota's two flagship schools, while UND supporters think of UND as the only flagship school. Neither has any such official status, so it's largely a matter of opinion. Especially given the fact the the common defintion of "Flagship University" really does not apply to the situation in North Dakota.

Anyway, this disagreement does serve as an example of why Mr. Kiefer's proposal to combine the two schools would be extremely difficult to accomplish. NDSU supporters and UND supporters will argue endlessly to prevent their school (or city) from losing status relative to the other.

Keep talking, you folks have made huge progress already, just by communicating for a short while. That is really, in large measure, how we will get this done. That's how you eat an elephant, just one bite at a time! Rome was not built in one day!! North Dakota feeds the world. North Dakota provides energy to our nation, Why shouldn't we be able to compete academically, research grant wise, and athletically with the UNIVERSITY OF NORTH DAKOTA STATE leading the way.

[Bill Kiefer]

True enough, but it's also true that UND is not the "original campus" from which NDSU grew in any way. So, the defintion given does not exclude NDSU as a "Flagship University". In fact, NDSU status as a Land Grant institution does give it a status that UND simply does not share. North Dakota is generally considered to have two "Flagship Universities"

Let's concede that there are two flagship universities for purposes of discussion. Then why not be the first state to combine two flagship universities and create a Super Flagship University? Let's celebrate the outstanding past accomplishments of both institutions, but embrace the future of an institution that will become a pacesetter for higher education in the entire country.

[MplsBison]

I completely support the idea that the NDUS could use more work to make it a more efficient system that fits the profile of our state. It is a bit rediculous that North Dakota has 11 public higher-ed institutions. On top of that, there are more 4 year institutions that 2 year. Add in UMary and Jamestown College and ND is way too saturated with 4 year universities. There is also no reason that we need 4 institutions offering graduate level degrees. Once again, you add in UMary's Masters program and we again have too many universitites fighting for graduate students.

I think that the state combing all colleges and universities into 1 university system was a great first step. The roundtables that were to continue to shape the system have unfortunately been extremely disappointing and inefficient. I appreciate the idea that Team North Dakota has as far as continuing to improve the university system, I just don't see how taking the 2 highest profile universities in the system and combining them without addressing any of the other issues in the system is good for ND. Why would we not want to have as many high profile, nationally ranked universities as possible?

Different ideas have been adressed numberous times in different forums such as this, the media, or in community settings, but here is my humble vision for the NDUS:

Top 100 nationally ranked graduate/research institutions:

UND

NDSU

Top ranked regional universities, undergraduate only:

Central Dakota University (Minot)

Western Dakota University (Dickinson)

2 year regional colleges:

Williston State College

Bottineau State College

Lake Region State College

Bismarck State College

Valley City State College

Mayville State College

North Dakota State College of Science

I think that every college and university in the state needs to have a better defined mission. The two year colleges would be trade/tech schools as well as feeder schools to the 4 four-year universities. Each could have a specialization beyond their general offerings of english, math, science classes and cover a broad spectrum of offerings such as diesel tech, beautician/cosmotology/ message, etc. I would like to see Wahpeton go back to its science/tech roots. Bottineau could continue to specialize in forestry, game & fish, etc. Williston and Bismarck could build on their specializations in tech/associate degrees in energy. Valley City and Mayville would cover all of your general 2 year college courses and work as a net to catch all of the transfers and drop-outs of UND/NDSU that end up going over the boarder to Minnesota to all of their 2 year colleges.

WDU (Dickinson) and CDU (Minot) would focus on undergraduate degrees and not offer any of their own graduate level courses. Each should be in the 4-5,000 enrollment range.

UND and NDSU would continue to grow and build into top 100 national universities and build up their graduate level offerings. With today's technology, UND, NDSU, WDU and CDU could all offer 4 year degrees at the 2 year colleges through such things as IVAN, online, correspondence, etc. And then UND and NDSU could also offer graduate level degrees at WDU and CDU through the same means.

I think this would really streamline the system and give better missions to all of the universities as well as be a better use of resources. There is absolutely no reason that Valley City needs to be offering a graduate degree right now!

Minot, Dickenson, Valley City and Mayville would fight it to the bitter end. They'll play the BS "the big schools are picking on us poor, rural ND" and "the big city ND leaders out east don't care about the small town ND people anymore!" cards. They'll make it a really ugly, PR nightmare.

Truth is that even if that's what's best for the system and for the state...they don't care. They don't want to give up anything that they have now.

It would take a politician sacrificing his career in order to get this done, and no one wants to do that.

[Bill Kiefer]

Minot, Dickenson, Valley City and Mayville would fight it to the bitter end. They'll play the BS "the big schools are picking on us poor, rural ND" and "the big city ND leaders out east don't care about the small town ND people anymore!" cards. They'll make it a really ugly, PR nightmare.

Truth is that even if that's what's best for the system and for the state...they don't care. They don't want to give up anything that they have now.

It would take a politician sacrificing his career in order to get this done, and no one wants to do that.

Team North Dakota is on record opposing the closure of any institution of higher education in our Great State. We do favor the discussion on combining the two schools of UND and NDSU where 70% of expenditures take place.

[MplsBison]

Team North Dakota is on record opposing the closure of any institution of higher education in our Great State. We do favor the discussion on combining the two schools of UND and NDSU where 70% of expenditures take place.

Ah. Now I get it.

This whole charade is nothing more than a tongue-in-cheek retort from the small schools to the never ending calls for the NDUS's smallest universities to be closed and resources re-allocated to the research universities, NDSU and UND.

Instead, your "how do you like it!" idea on saving money is to combine NDSU and UND to reduce costs.

That's cute.

Guess what? Too bad. The money and the power in the NDUS is in the red river valley and always will be. If I had it my way, there wouldn't be a single bachelor's degree awarded from any NDUS school, except NDSU and UND. That's how it should be, like Wyoming except two flagships instead of one.

Parents from all corners of Minnesota send their kids to be educated at the U of Minnesota in Minneapolis, because that's the state's flagship campus. That's where you go if you want the highest class of post secondary education the state can offer. Same in North Dakota.

[Bill Kiefer]

Ah. Now I get it.

This whole charade is nothing more than a tongue-in-cheek retort from the small schools to the never ending calls for the NDUS's smallest universities to be closed and resources re-allocated to the research universities, NDSU and UND.

Instead, your "how do you like it!" idea on saving money is to combine NDSU and UND to reduce costs.

That's cute.

Guess what? Too bad. The money and the power in the NDUS is in the red river valley and always will be. If I had it my way, there wouldn't be a single bachelor's degree awarded from any NDUS school, except NDSU and UND. That's how it should be, like Wyoming except two flagships instead of one.

Parents from all corners of Minnesota send their kids to be educated at the U of Minnesota in Minneapolis, because that's the state's flagship campus. That's where you go if you want the highest class of post secondary education the state can offer. Same in North Dakota.

Why do so many Minnesota students attend both schools? Combine the two, upgrade certain curricula, join the Big Ten and those humbers will increase. When you get out of our cozy area of the world most people don't even know the difference between UND/NDSU, combine into One Super Flagship University and they probably won't ever forget.

[Bill Kiefer]

I can't believe anyone is giving this Keifer character the time of day. We all know that this idea is going NOWHERE. I have to wonder if he will even get a single ND Legislator to sponsor his pipe dream. I would say this guy is having what my old psychology professor called "his Andy Warhol moment". Now that Mr. Keifer has had his 15 minutes of fame thanks to the Herald giving him the attention he craved, let's move on. Why do we always end up with the nutty Bison trolls here anyway?

There have been two Mr. Kiefers in my life, one died in 1957(my grandfather) and the other in 1994(my father), I can very easily be addressed as Bill, but my biggest concern is that you spell a person's last name coreectly. It is Kiefer not Keifer. I may be a character but at least they know my name and I am not operating under some cyberspace alias. As to the legislative comment, if the petition route is followed there is no need for any legislative sponsorship. Also I believe they also said the forward pass will never catch on, they will never fill the second deck of the Ralph, and Seward was a fool for buying Alaska. This effort is gaining support on a slow and steady basis. In order to oppose the idea you have to be negative and that is a tough side to bet on in any debate. Check out our website www.teamnorthdakota.com and monitor our progress.

[Big A HG]

Hi Bill, my name is Adam (that's what the A is for)...although I'm not the big dude my alias suggests. I am here today to tell you that you are an idiot.

Have a nice day.

[Bill Kiefer]

You can make derogatory comments all you want. It just dimishes you not the discussion.

[passit_offthegoalie]

I don't know why you are even trying to convince any of the cyberspace hackers that populate the internet. We are all too busy stealing people's identities and hacking into military mainframes and junk.

[Bill Kiefer]

If I knew your last name or anyone else's for that matter I would make sure I spelled their name correctly. That is just common courtesy. As for never dealing with this issue, our committee, or even myself for that matter that is your right in a free society. Hopefully, if you even live in this Great State, you will get your chance to weigh in on this issue through the ballot box. Vaya Con Dios Amigo or Amiga!

[GeauxSioux]

If I knew your last name or anyone else's for that matter I would make sure I spelled there name correctly. That is just common courtesy. As for never dealing with this issue, our committee, or even myself for that matter that is your right in a free society. Hopefully, if you even live in this Great State, you will get your chance to weigh in on this issue through the ballot box. Vaya Con Dios Amigo or Amiga!

Are you sure your name isn't Lyle Lanley?

[Goon]

If I knew your last name or anyone else's for that matter I would make sure I spelled there name correctly. That is just common courtesy. As for never dealing with this issue, our committee, or even myself for that matter that is your right in a free society. Hopefully, if you even live in this Great State, you will get your chance to weigh in on this issue through the ballot box. Vaya Con Dios Amigo or Amiga!

Potato Potato; this is nothing more than a side show that is going no where. There will be no combining NDSU and UND.

[Bill Kiefer]

Potato

[Goon]

OK then we will stop!

It's not going to happen. You can wink at me all you want, it's a fringe idea.

[ScottM]

Berkeley has no Med School

UCLA does. Besides I was thinking more about schools like Texas, Colorado, Minnesota, etc. rather than the morass on the left coast.

[Bill Kiefer]

It's not going to happen. You can wink at me all you want, it's a fringe idea.

So was the Declaration of Independence in the beginning, Jefferson shouldn't have made the Lousiana Purchase, Ed Melroe's combine attachment will never get off the ground, Sanford will never buy Meritcare, Grand Forks will lose it's airbase. How is that for openers! I promise not to wink at you anymore.

[darell1976]

So was the Declaration of Independence in the beginning, Jefferson shouldn't have made the Lousiana Purchase, Ed Melroe's combine attachment will never get off the ground, Sanford will never buy Meritcare, Grand Forks will lose it's airbase. How is that for openers! I promise not to wink at you anymore.

When are you going to get these petitions going? Also what are your timetables are you aiming for a public vote for November or something in 2011? Also how long do you intend on fighting for this issue? Are you in it until the first vote fails or are you going to push it and push it until it passes no matter how many decades it takes.

[Bill Kiefer]

When are you going to get these petitions going? Also what are your timetables are you aiming for a public vote for November or something in 2011? Also how long do you intend on fighting for this issue? Are you in it until the first vote fails or are you going to push it and push it until it passes no matter how many decades it takes.

Fisrt of all 2012 in June(the primary) or in November(the general election) would be the first it could be on the ballot. It is Un-American to be a quitter, hopefully that answers your question on persistence and determination. Also there are two ways for this to get on the ballot, one is signatures from 4% of the 2010 ND census and the other is a simple majority vote of both the senate and the house in our legislature. The second one is basically a resolution putting it on the ballot for the eligible voters to decide. It is my understanding it does not need any approval from the governor's office or the Board of Higher Education. Thanks for the inquiry! Our website www.teamnorthdakota.com will answer and hopefully highlite these kind of questions in the future.

[choyt3]

A couple questions for Mr. Kiefer:

1. Why were all the business names removed from the "members" area of the website set up for this alleged campaign?
2. Is the reference to Tom Clifford still there?
3. Do you use his name (former distinguished UND President Tom Clifford) to get the "UND vote"? Or did you truly have a conversation with him concerning this exact proposal you are setting forth and had his blessing on the matter?

[darell1976]

Fisrt of all 2012 in June(the primary) or in November(the general election) would be the first it could be on the ballot. It is Un-American to be a quitter, hopefully that answers your question on persistence and determination. Also there are two ways for this to get on the ballot, one is signatures from 4% of the 2010 ND census and the other is a simple majority vote of both the senate and the house in our legislature. The second one is basically a resolution putting it on the ballot for the eligible voters to decide. It is my understanding it does not need any approval from the governor's office or the Board of Higher Education. Thanks for the inquiry! Our website www.teamnorthdakota.com will answer and hopefully highlite these kind of questions in the future.

How is this being funded? How much does it cost to put something like this for a vote? 4% of 646,844 (2009 est.) is 25,873 that is a lot of signatures....Good luck!!