WV Executive

When the progression from a college to a university occurs at an educational facility, the announcement brightens people's outlook because it gives hope to each person, regardless of their age or educational level because they feel a connection to the event.

Concord College's becoming a university in July 2004 stands as a testament to the academic viability of the institution, the motivation of the leadership, and the connection between university growth and local economic development. Furthermore, the transition from a college to a university directly impact business and economic development.

The academic history of Concord College is impressive. Throughout its history, Concord has forged itself into a distinctive institution in Southern West Virginia. Specifically, Concord is the only public college in the country selected to participate in the Prestige's Bonner Scholars Program that provides 80 students with financial support toward their four-year education. Each student must then provide support to the community through volunteer services. Public service is an important part of Concord College's mission to the local community. The Corella and Bertram F. Bonner Foundation based in Princeton, New Jersey, has recognized this commitment to service and endowed the college with funds to establish the Bonner Scholarship Program. Bonner Scholars are typically first-generation college students with a record of academic success and a demonstrated concern for their home community. During the scholar's tenure at Concord College, they provide an average of 10 hours of community support per week during the regular school year and 240 hours of service during the summer.

Gaining National Recognition

U.S. News & World Report's America's Best Colleges has ranked Concord in the top three in peer assessment scores among comprehensive colleges offering bachelor's degrees in the South for the past three years. The Wall Street Journal has ranked Concord College 13th in the nation of best undergraduate public colleges and universities for admission of their alumni to the nation's most selective graduate schools. Concord enrolls students from 28 states and 30 countries. The Institution's enrollment is booming, having grown 36 percent from 1997 to 2001, compared to 3 percent growth for all other state institutions, according to the Higher Education Policy Commission's Enrollment Report of Fall 2001. Employers find Concord students assets in the work force because 19.3 percent of Concord graduates are being recruited for their first job which rises above the national average of 12.7 percent, according to the American College Testing Program Alumni Survey of August 2001.

Many of the college's recent graduates have continued their education at such graduate schools as: American University, Carnegie-Mellon, Case-Western Reserve, Columbia, Cornell, Duke, Georgetown, Harvard, James Madison, New York Film Academy, Old Dominion, Stanford, University of California-Berkeley, Vanderbilt, Virginia Tech, Wake Forest, Washington & Lee, West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine, West Virginia University and William & Mary, as well as many other graduate schools throughout the United States. To further inspire students to continue postgraduate studies, Concord has received a Ronald McNair Program grant-the school is the only West Virginia state college to receive the McNair grant. The McNair Scholars Program is a federal TRIO program designed to prepare students to participate in doctoral study programs. The program provides enriching experiences to prepare undergraduates for doctoral studies including a research internship, seminars and workshops, interactions with faculty and the opportunity to attend and present their research at national meetings. Although the program provides a stipend for students to pursue a summer research project, McNair is not a scholarship program. Eligible students must be enrolled in a degree-granting program and be either economically disadvantaged, first-generation college students or members of a group that is underrepresented in graduate school.

Concord offers more than 80 academic programs and features pre-professional emphasis in dentistry, law, medicine, pharmacy and physical therapy. The school, also, is part of an "education consortium" with West Virginia University, Marshall University, WVU Institute of Technology and Southern WV Community & Technical College. This consortium's goal is to bring low-cost, public higher education to the Beckley area.

Concord's graduates are more than twice as likely to earn $50,000 per year as graduates of peer institutions, according to the American College Testing Program Alumni Survey. Three Concord alumni were included in the Charleston Gazette's listing last July of West Virginia's best-paid executives: John M. Mendez of First Community Bancshares (Class of 1978); H. Charles Maddy, Summit Financial Group (Class of 1985); and Robert L. Buzzo, First Community Bancshares (Class of 1972).

ZDNet has ranked Concord College Number 52 of more than 1,000 colleges in the most recent nationwide survey of "most-wired colleges." Academic reputation and reasonable cost are two of the top reasons students choose to attend the college.

Motivation behind the Leadership

"Our fellow citizens have called us to a new and higher realm of service. We will strive to meet and exceed these expectations. The future of the region requires no less," says President Jerry Beasley, reflecting on the April 20th resolution that officially named the 132-year-old institution Concord University. Beasley and his team are committed to grow the school in a thoughtful step-by-step process. They are implementing a plan that outlines the importance of their mission to educate and inspire the next generation of leaders.

Public education certainly is not without criticism in West Virginia. Some of these apprehensions include: West Virginia has too many higher education institutions; the state should cut funding to higher education because it is expensive; and West Virginia may lose young, well-educated people to other states.

For the last 50 years, the United States has been in a non-stop technological revolution, which has shown no signs of slowing down. For the first time in history, the population demographics of the migration of people from east to west has leveled off. Citizens are searching for quality of life and a climate of opportunity, and this new frontier for which they search can just as easily be Southern West Virginia as Southern California.

How is Southern West Virginia positioning itself to be part of this next phase of technology and business development and how can Southern West Virginia play a key role in developing new businesses and technologies that the nation needs to keep its competitive edge in a world that changes daily? The answers come from redefining the relationships among business, academia, government and labor. Ideas are needed to test the limits of conventional thinking and universities like Concord in Southern West Virginia can be part of that unconventional thinking.

Local Economic Development

A $7.6 million Technology Center is being constructed on campus which makes the center strategically located near Interstate 64 in the section deemed "Silicon Mountains" by Congressman Nick Joe Rahall, II. In November 2001, an exploratory committee was formed by Beasley to research the potentials of electronic technologies for Concord College. The technology building committee received a grant through the efforts of Senator Robert C. Byrd for $1 million through the fund for the Improvement of Post Secondary Education. The John Baker White Hall will be converted into the technology center with a business incubator that focuses on bringing academic and community improvement. It will also serve a multifaceted purpose: students and faculty will research and learn the newest technologies in electronic communications and then communicate with local, established business and start-up companies. The center will begin providing technology support and educational opportunities for the community. Working with the regional economic development groups, the business incubator will graduate new companies at a rate of two to three per year.

"The business incubator piece of the project will provide the physical space, support equipment and first class human resources and consulting," says Beasley. These extra facets will enhance the overall usefulness of the Technology Center to new businesses in the area and encourage the growing alliance between business and education. The second objective for the project was to develop and fund the technology center by grants and gifts. Senator Byrd has continued to support the effort with additional grants of $2 million to the institution.

United States Congressman Nick Joe Rahall has directed $3.1 million in Housing and Urban Development and Economic Development grants to the project. In the spring of 2004, the board of governors of Concord voted to name the facility in honor of Congressman Rahall to recognize the key role he has played to bring forth the money to develop a regional technology center for Southern West Virginia. Construction should be complete by spring 2006.

"Concord College is confident of its role contributing to the successes of West Virginia, but cost cutting alone will not prepare Concord College for the role it must play," says Beasley. "Major new financial resources are needed to sharpen our technological edge, keep our faculty in the forefront of their fields, attract and encourage the most talented students, and reach new constituencies with distance education. Much of this investment must come from the private sector: individuals, corporations, foundations, and others who believe in Concord's potential and in the role of public higher education in West Virginia's future."

Concord College, in an effort to assure its own future and its students' success, has initiated a capital campaign to build its endowment; to assure annual support for technology, faculty, staff and student financial aid; to support the development of new programs and to construct vital facilities. The capital campaign seeks up to $25 million in new resources throughout a six year period. This campaign will afford the college the means to provide high-quality education to its students. Concord's academic reputation has already attracted significant financial support, but the college must continue to focus on growing its endowment to meet its mission next year and in the years that follow.