Bemidji State University - Profile

Modest Beginnings

After offering a successful summer session to 130 students, Bemidji Normal School launched its first fall term on September 2, 1919. The school year started with 10 faculty and staff members and 38 students. That year, the school had its first library acquisitions, a Webster's dictionary and a second-hand set of Encyclopedia Britannica. One extracurricular activity was offered, the Dramatic Club. No athletic teams existed.

A Robust Campus

Ninety years later, Bemidji State University has over 5,000 students and a faculty-staff of about 600. The wooded, lakeside campus is fully networked with over 95% of the classrooms designated as "smart" classrooms. The University has more than 75 student clubs and organizations as well as 17 athletic teams, including a Division I hockey program.

Undergraduate students have over 65 majors and pre-professional program options from which to choose. Graduate students can select from 14 graduate programs, including distance and online options in education and industrial technology areas.

Among the faculty, over 85% have earned a doctorate or the highest degree in their field.

Strategic Direction

Bemidji State's strategic direction emanates from its mission and vision. The University's vision is to shape the potential of those it serves, so they, in turn, will shape the worlds in which they live and work. BSU goals are to engage in new worlds of thought, embrace civic engagement, and educate for a world that can only be imagined.

A Focused Identity and Purpose

Through strategic planning and implementation, significant strides have been made in sharpening the University's identity and sculpting its curriculum to support that identity while meeting the needs and interests of on-campus and online students.

Within the past two years, the University has updated its strategic plan; refined its mission and vision; renewed its commitment to the signatures themes of environmental stewardship, civic engagement, and multicultural/international awareness; restructured its colleges; and re-focused its identity from that of a comprehensive university to one that offers arts, sciences, and select professional programs. Programs considered enrollment drivers have received targeted resources.

Commitment to Student Success

While enhancing its academic programs, Bemidji State has also strengthened services to students. In 2007, a new vice president of student development enrollment management position was created, with many student services units incorporated into the new division. Also that year, the Advising Success Center opened to help ensure that all students have access to support in transitioning successfully to college.

Services include: advising, assessment, tutoring, new student orientation, First Year Experience Program and the First Year Residential Experience. Other units within the division also provide critical support services to targeted student groups. Those units include the American Indian Resource Center, Disabilities Services, Trio SSS, and Veterans Services.

A student leadership development center is currently being planned.

Enrollment Continues to Rise

Bemidji State's official fall head count was 5,171, an increase of 6% over Fall 2008 when the University had 4,876 students. The University's increase was the highest among the system's seven four-year universities. Overall, head count enrollment in the system's seven universities was up 3.3 percent, to 68,076 students.

Credit generation, which plays a more critical role in the University's budget than headcount, reflected an increase nearly mirroring that of head-count enrollment. The overall credit load was 62,924 credits, a 6.8 % increase from a year ago.

New students helped fuel the increase in credit generation, with freshmen enrollment continuing its six-year rise. Bemidji State's 808-member class of new incoming freshmen accounted for 4.3 % more credits than last year, while transfers (13.8 %) and PSEO high-school students (25.9 %) contributed substantially to the increase among new students, as well. In total, Bemidji State's undergraduate population generated 7.2 % more credits than in 2008, while graduate students accounted for a 5.6 % credit increase.

While total on-campus credits rose by 5.1% over last year, credits generated through distance education rose 15% overall. Online education accounted for an 18% rise in distance education credits.

Enrollment Status

  • Full-time Undergraduate, 76%
  • Part-time Undergraduate, 24%
  • Full-Time Graduate, 23%
  • Part-Time Graduate, 77%

Demographics

  • 53% female, 47% male
  • 6% students of color
  • Over 85% - Minnesota residents
  • Over 10% - Non-Minnesota residents
  • Students from 34 states and nearly 40 countries

Related Info

  • Average ACT: 22
  • Six-year Graduation Rate: 46.5%
  • Over 80% of undergraduates receive financial aid
  • $1.5 m in total scholarships awarded in 2009-2010

Budget

Through its strategic planning and budgeting process, Bemidji State University has been able to proactively address and successfully respond to today's economic challenges. In 2007, the University announced an institutional-initiated, three-year plan to reduce, restructure, and invest resources to prepare the institution for a viable future within fiscal realities. Budget adjustments made then - including $4 million in reductions and $1 million in new revenue streams - have lessened the impact of budget shortfalls faced by the state and its public colleges and universities in subsequent years. The 2010 general fund operating budget is $47 million. Approximately 40% is state support.

New Programs; New Venues

Within the past few years, new programs have been developed in enrollment-driver areas, including a four-year nursing program, a bachelor's in applied engineering, and B.S. programs in management information systems and in engineering technology. New online programs have included B.S. programs in the criminal justice and in business administration. In Fall 2009, a new RN-to-BS program started in the Twin Cities metro area thanks to a partnership with Anoka Ramsey Community College. Enrollment in these programs is strong and growing rapidly.

Investment in Facilities

In the past five years, the University has invested over $27 million in renovating and expanding facilities. Recent investments have included:

  • CAET Addition and Bridgeman Hall Renovation (Technological Studies) - $9,000,000
  • Sattgast Hall Renovation and Addition (Sciences, Nursing) - $9,600,000
  • Clinical Resource Center (Nursing) in Memorial Hall - $600,000
  • Linden Hall Renovation (Residential Life) - $8,500,000

Partnerships Extend Resources and Services

Bemidji State's programs and services are strengthened by its partnerships. By partnering with the city of Bemidji, for instance, BSU is an anchor tenant in the city's new Bemidji Regional Events Center (BREC) and its hockey teams will move to the $60,000,000 facility in Fall 2010.

Similarly, in 2008, BSU's nationally recognized Outdoor Program Center (OPC) partnered with the city of Bemidji by leasing a new, city-owned, lakeside facility at Diamond Point Park, an award-winning city venue adjacent to the Bemidji State University campus. The new location enables the OPC to offer its programs and equipment rentals to area residents as well as to the campus community.

With support from the American Indian community in northwest Minnesota, Bemidji State celebrated the opening of its American Indian Resource Center (AIRC) in 2003. Providing educational and cultural programs for the region as well as the campus community, the center also offers opportunities for guidance, support, and cultural interaction to the University's American Indian students.

On a smaller scale, hundreds of relationships have been established with regional businesses and organizations. One such initiative is the Bemidji Area Chamber of Commerce-Bemidji State University Collaborative Partnerships. The group's purpose is to increase awareness of the resources available within both organizations and to undertake projects that will have a positive impact on communities in the area. Building a strong talent pool for northwest Minnesota through internships has been a recent focus.

Service to Business and Industry

Bemidji State has several units helping business, industry, and organizations better understand their markets or service areas, improve their processes, increase their profits, and maintain viability and vitality in today's economy.

Those BSU units include the Center for Research and Innovation (CRI) and the recently debuted Institute of Technology, Entrepreneurship and Innovation. Each year, CRI fulfills 25-30 business and industry contracts, while providing support to area organizations and educational partners, as well. The institute, administered by the College of Business, Technology and Communication, combines the existing offices of the 360° Manufacturing and Applied Engineering Center of Excellence, the Northwest Regional Small Business Development Center and the Marketing Assistance and Research Solutions, a student-run, faculty directed unit.

The institute is also home to three new initiatives: the Entrepreneurial Scholarship Pathways, Technology Assistance and Research Solutions, and FastTrack Entrepreneurship programs.

Sustainability Commitment

Green not only represents BSU's colors, but also its commitment to the environment. In 1969, the University opened the Center for Environmental Studies to teach classes and conduct research in the field. By the 1990's the University established the Environmental Advisory Committee, which promoted the recycling and reduction of waste on campus and offered a People and the Environment course, which is a required liberal education course for every undergraduate.

In 2004, significant environmental initiatives took place, including establishing environmental stewardship as one of the University's three signature themes. The themes emerged as a result of regional stakeholder meetings. Through joint efforts between student leaders and BSU administration, the University also began purchasing wind-generated power for Hobson Memorial Union. Student fees helped finance the purchase. In that same year, BSU administrators signed the Talloires Declaration, a 10-point plan to address fundamental environmental challenges.

In 2007, students endorsed a $5 per semester green fee, which has generated more than $40,000 to support a sustainability coordinator and fund student projects. Two years later, the University endorsed the President's Campus Climate Committee, which sets BSU on a climate-neutral course. In May, Bemidji State University was declared the winner of the Minnesota Campus Energy Challenge, an energy-reduction competition among seven higher education institutions in the state. A strategic plan for sustainability is currently being developed.

Noteworthy

  • BSU earned top-tier Midwest master's institution status for the second consecutive year in U.S. News and World Report rankings.
  • 27% of freshmen enrolling in Fall 2008 graduated in the top quarter of their high school class, once again placing BSU among Minnesota's top public universities for the percentage of high-achieving freshmen.
  • Over $20 million in legacies has been established.
  • Faculty honors have included a Guggenheim fellow being named 2008 and a Fulbright research scholar named in 2009.
  • Since 2000, nine BSU athletes have earned Academic All-America honors.
  • The University has nearly 40,000 alumni, with over half of them living in Minnesota. Of those residing in the state, 10,279 of them live in the Twin Cities metro area.
  • The men's hockey team won the NCAA Division I Men's Ice Hockey Championship in March 2009 and earned a Frozen Four berth.
  • BSU Today maintains current and archived news about Bemidji State University and the activities of its faculty, staff, and students.
  • Horizons, BSU's premier publication, features faculty, staff, students, alumni, and donors who are shaping the worlds in which they work and live.