UMaine Doctoral Program to Benefit Community Colleges
Contact: Joe Carr at (207) 581-3571
ORONO — The University of Maine and the state’s two southernmost community colleges have crafted an innovative plan aimed at expanding doctoral education opportunities for community college faculty and leaders. Starting in Fall 2007 and Spring 2008 Southern Maine Community College and York County Community College administrators and faculty members will enroll in UMaine’s nationally recognized Higher Education Leadership doctoral program. UMaine will tailor specific work for these students in the context of a program serving college and universities in every corner of the state, so they can work together over a five-to-six-year period to earn their degrees.
Staff and faculty members at other Maine community colleges, including Eastern Maine Community College, will also have access to the program and opportunities to join their southern Maine colleagues as part of a statewide student group. The doctoral experience will help build networks across higher education sectors in the state facilitating long-term collaboration.
“UMaine and the state’s community colleges are key partners in educating Maine citizens and preparing them for a brighter future,” says UMaine President Robert Kennedy. “By providing doctoral-level education to these talented and dedicated higher education professionals, UMaine can assist them in further enhancing the community college experience for large numbers of Maine people.”
Kennedy points out that this arrangement grew from discussions initiated last year by Southern Maine Community College President James Ortiz. He says that this initiative shows UMaine’s ability and willingness to respond to a state need.
“As community colleges work to increase access to higher education for more Mainers, we are developing more partnerships with the state’s universities,” Ortiz says. “Arrangements like this will help our state move toward having more citizens with college degrees, increasing aspirations and setting the stage for further developing Maine’s economy.”
UMaine will deliver the program through a combination of distance education classes and on-site courses taught by UMaine professors with supplemental coursework through universities in other parts of Maine.
“Extending university expertise for positive statewide impact is an important part of what UMaine does as the state’s flagship university,” says Robert Cobb, dean of UMaine’s College of Education and Human Development. “The Education Leadership program has allowed us to provide doctoral education to dozens of educational leaders around Maine, and this new initiative represents a natural next step to focus on the state’s growing community college system.”
Cobb points out that community college leaders have long been interested in promoting the UMaine doctoral program as a means for advancing community college faculties and staffs. Eastern Maine Community College President Joyce Hedlund and Kennebec Valley Community College President Barbara Woodlee were involved in planning the UMaine program’s original curriculum.
The UMaine doctoral program began in 1999. Twenty students are currently enrolled in it.
Charles Lyons, the York County Community College president and former University of Maine at Fort Kent and University of Maine at Augusta president, has a unique perspective on this new arrangement. He says that more than half the students at his institution are studying arts and sciences, with plans to move into university baccalaureate programs. Lyons sees an increasing need for community college faculty members who have doctorates.
“The university system and the community college system are working together to meet an important need,” Lyons says. “Maine’s taxpayers expect us to collaborate in this way, and cooperative programs of this nature really distinguish Maine higher education.”
“One of UMaine’s unique characteristics is its capacity to offer doctorates in a wide range of fields, and to deliver them in innovative ways,” says Edna Mora Szymanski, UMaine’s senior vice president for academic affairs and provost. “In educational fields, this has a real impact because educators and educational leaders with doctorates can help to increase student achievement while influencing positive educational outcomes at all levels.”