Viking Bold's academic pillar furthers graduate, professional programs

This is the second part of a continuing series on Viking Bold.

Now in phase two of its 10-year strategic plan, Augustana has made several strides under Viking Bold’s academic pillar. 

Under the first part of Viking Bold’s academic goals, Augustana has established a new academic governance structure, new majors and minors and an interdisciplinary center. 

Part two of the academic pillar focuses on developing new academic programs that will generate additional revenue and address the needs of the region’s workforce.

Four pillars constitute the Viking Bold plan: academics, enrollment and strategic scholarships, athletics and physical campus and IT. Each phase occurs over three to four years. 

“It's a strategic plan that gives us guidance, direction and steps along the way to make sure that we actually are able to get to our goals by the end of the decade,” Interim Provost Joel Johnson said. “So it's across the whole campus. It's not just academics, but it's an integrative plan so that we're all moving forward together in the same direction.”

According to President Stephanie Herseth Sandlin, the plan is informed by trends in higher education and the needs and opportunities of Sioux Falls and South Dakota. 

Creating graduate and professional programs

Given its focus on addressing workforce needs, many of part two’s goals have an emphasis on establishing graduate and professional programs. 

“One thing we’ve really been focused on is disrupting the traditional pathways towards some of these professions,” Johnson said. 

While professional careers, like physical therapy and optometry, are in high demand, Johnson said students often encounter barriers in pursuing them, such as cost and time. 

Johnson said including new post-undergraduate education opportunities also presents a valuable asset to the city. 

“As Sioux Falls continues to grow rapidly, Augustana sees itself as being that partner,” Johnson said. “And not just providing what it always provided, which is an excellent undergraduate education grounded in the liberal arts, but also to provide these other things.” 

Part 2a says Augustana will establish a professional school based on what fields in the community need more employees. 

In phase one of part 2a, Augustana conducted feasibility studies for optometry, dentistry and aeronautics. Herseth Sandlin said strategic partners mentioned these as being professional schools that could meet their needs. 

Augustana first worked with a consultant, partners and alumni to explore the possibility of creating an optometry school, which Herseth Sandlin said has potential. 

“The timing of it is a little uncertain because any of these professional schools are very expensive to launch,” Herseth Sandlin said. 

Phases two and three of part 2a are devoted to the development of a program proposal and a new professional school alongside strategic partners. Currently, though, Augustana has no concrete plans to establish an optometry school. 

“We would want to make sure that we did it in a way that was most fitting to what our capabilities are and what the best practices out there are,” Johnson said. “And maybe not just the best practices of what other people are doing, but what is the best way of doing it given that we’re in the early 21st century and everything is changing?”

Adding new degree programs

Under part 2b, Viking Bold outlines goals of establishing new undergraduate and graduate degree programs that align with students’ interests and community needs. 

From 2019 to 2022, Augustana established majors in biomechanical engineering and forensics in addition to creating a master’s in business administration, doctor of physical therapy and graduate nursing and occupational therapy degrees. The Higher Learning Commission also approved a fintech major at the university in the previous academic year.

“Coming in, I would have never guessed that I would have wanted to do a master’s program,” senior MBA student Michelle Becker said. “I was very intimidated by the thought of that. Like, it never crossed my mind.” 

Becker’s intermediate accounting professor first posed the idea to Becker of joining the MBA program. Now, she said she’s gaining the knowledge required for her certified public accounting exam. 

“I think in general, the amount of students that are wanting to do the program has increased exponentially,” Becker said. “There [are more] people in my classes than in previous cohorts, and so I think more people are trying to take advantage of it because it is such a good deal.” 

As part 2b moves into phase two, the university will continue to expand program offerings, examples of which may include data science/analytics and public administration. 

A plan of Viking Bold’s expansion has not come without its challenges, though. The plan went into effect in 2020, the same year the COVID-19 pandemic caused global shutdowns. 

“As our now-current board Chair Pat Macadaragh says, ‘Whoever thought that the first leg of the journey would be the rockiest and steepest part?’” Herseth Sandlin said. 

Johnson said the pandemic coincided with several transformations in the field of education, all of which occurred during phase one of Viking Bold. 

“Maybe you thought this program would be great in phase three to explore, but now something else has arisen that kind of takes our attention,” Johnson said. “I would say one of those would be artificial intelligence.” 

Johnson said the larger goals of the plan, such as enrolling 3,000 students and making college more affordable, will remain; however, some particulars could continue to be reevaluated. 

“It’s a moment of real transformational change that we’re in,” Johnson said. “The old ways of thinking about universities and of education are all being shaken. But that’s also fun.” 

Johnson said the most difficult part of the strategic plan under a transforming sphere of universities and education is knowing when to shift directions or hold the plan steady. 

International and domestic partnerships

A goal of creating more international and domestic partnerships rounds out part two of Viking Bold’s academic pillar. In the first phase, Augustana set out to “deepen” relationships with tribal colleges and their existing partners at secondary schools and universities in Norway and Asia. 

“As someone who has taught East Asian politics, when you talk about Asia, what does that mean? It means billions of people across immense land mass,” Johnson said. “I think when we talk about Asia, we’re talking about expanding the map of who’s going to be an Augustana student, and that geography is not the barrier it once was.” 

Johnson said Augustana wants to continue its heritage connections with Norway and build on them. 

According to Johnson, these relationships between Augustana and other domestic and global schools are multifaceted. 

“It’s about, do our leaders know their leaders? Do their students come here? Do our students go there? Are there opportunities for collaboration that don’t involve travel?” Johnson said. 

Global partnerships have also found their way in Costa Rica. Augustana partnered with Seeds of Change, an organic food company, to offer transfer credit to high school students who complete bioinformatics research in Costa Rica. 

During the 2021-2022 academic year, Augustana also developed a relationship with the Native American Connections Leadership Team in the Sioux Falls School District. The intended outcome of the partnership is to help create a path for Native American students to meet with Augustana faculty, staff and students and introduce them to “an institutional sense of belonging.” 

Partnerships with secondary schools will span outside of the U.S., too. 

A group of Norwegian high schoolers came to Augustana in January, and a group of students from Wuhan, China, will visit in February. 

“They’re not enrolling as students here. The hope is that maybe they will,” Johnson said. “But you just forge those connections as early on as you can, and you build on them.” 

The Wuhan group will live on campus and take English lessons during their stay. 

“I think my sense of Augustana right now is that it's well positioned,” Johnson said. “So we're not embracing change for the sake of change, but we are open to the change that's appropriate for getting to the goals of the strategic plan.”