The two finalists to lead the Minnesota State system of 26 colleges and seven universities delivered aspirational messages about higher education Thursday during back-to-back public forums.
Tonja Johnson rejected the notion that college should simply be about workforce development.
“I’m not interested in grooming students to just go into the workforce to push buttons,” she said. “We need to get students into our campuses so that they can be more than what people told them they can be.”
Scott Olson spoke of the Minnesota Miracle of 1971, when lawmakers overhauled the way the state pays for education in order to reduce inequities while also cutting property taxes.
Equity in education was “the right dream, it just hasn’t been fully fulfilled yet,” Olson said, pointing to persistent and wide achievement gaps among racial and ethnic groups in the state.
Minnesota State’s colleges and universities, Olson said, enroll more students of color than all other higher education institutions in the state combined.
“Who, if not us, is going to get us to that North Star … to help Minnesota realize all its hopes and dreams?” he said.
Decision next month
The Board of Trustees is expected to appoint its next chancellor May 9 to take over in July following Devinder Malhotra’s retirement. On the surface, the two finalists are quite different.
Johnson, 54, is the senior vice chancellor for academic affairs for the University of Alabama System. She’s Black, registered as a Republican during Barack Obama’s first term – the last time she lived in a state that required that information of voters – and married a future New Orleans Saints tight end, Troy Johnson, while he was a student at the University of Alabama.
Olson, 64, has been president of Winona State University – a part of the Minnesota State system – since 2012. He’s white, registered as a Democrat during Bill Clinton’s second term – the last time he lived in a party-registration state – and is married to a professional fundraiser, Kelley Olson.
Both finalists, however, have a background in communications and have spent several years working for higher education systems — the Alabama system has nearly 70,000 students (comparable to the University of Minnesota’s five campuses) while Minnesota State has around 300,000.
Johnson’s first job after college was as a newspaper reporter who covered higher education. She moved into public relations and marketing positions with Mississippi Valley State, Middle Tennessee State and then the University of Tennessee System before joining the Alabama system.
Olson started out as a communications professor and later became dean of Ball State University’s communications school. He was provost and vice president for academic and student affairs for nine years at Minnesota State University, Mankato, and spent a year at the Minnesota State system office as interim vice chancellor for academic and student affairs before taking the top job at Winona State.
Opportunity for all
During her hour of questions and answers Thursday, Johnson she “errs on the side of overcommunication,” pledging to solicit input from stakeholders before making big decisions. She said she values professional development for current and aspiring campus leaders. And she touted her lobbying experience in multiple states.
Johnson also promised to advance Malhotra’s efforts toward a more equitable system for students, saying it’s the right thing to do and adds value to students’ lives.
“If we’re looking toward a more vibrant Minnesota, it has to be about everybody,” she said. “This will be about encouraging everyone to believe in this idea that they can be more than, and as a state, we can be more than, and as a system, we can be more than. It’s about creating that opportunity for everyone.”
Olson said he, too, gained lobbying experience in his current role and that he “loves working at the Capitol.” He promised to find ways to keep in touch with students even though the system office isn’t on a campus. And he committed to removing financial barriers for students, saying there’s nothing more tragic than seeing students drop out because of money.
Asked about a long trend of declining college enrollment, Olson said there aren’t as many 18-year-old Minnesotans as there used to be, so schools need to recruit from other places and serve students in new ways.
“There are all kinds of students who don’t want to, aren’t able to, sit in a classroom Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 10 a.m. and who desperately need what we’re doing,” he said.
