Every higher education institution today faces challenges, whether it be declining enrollments and skyrocketing expenses, the need to confront the realities of climate change and all of its impacts, widespread social unrest and injustice, wars and violence, or the erosion of civil discourse. Stasis and business as usual, and the slow rate of change that characterizes universities, may not be sufficient to address those challenges. And it is definitely not adequate for imagining the role of universities, whose research, education, and engagement are foundational to preparing our future graduates to be leaders and innovators of tomorrow’s complex world. 

The University of Maine is globally connected. This year it enrolls students from 83 countries outside the United States, and its alumni from those countries total in the thousands. We must ensure that a UMaine education prepares future teachers, nurses, musicians, finance leaders, engineers, policymakers and more, not only for Maine but for the world.

Those of us from the University of Maine — home for more than 50 years to the world-renowned Climate Change Institute — know the realities of what the planet faces with a changing climate. Our scientists have helped to build current understandings of everything from what causes rapid glacial melt, to how climate changes worldwide directly affect sea-rise levels and the chemical composition of the Gulf of Maine, to how best to measure and predict climate-related weather variation with AI-based tools. A steady linear increase in the cumulative warming effects of greenhouse gases challenges the planet. Global increases in average annual temperatures are profoundly affecting human health, food and water supplies, and economies worldwide (World Health Organization, 2023).

This knowledge is not only contributing to the core of scientific foundations, it is informing policy, as reflected in Gov. Janet Mills’s Climate Action Plan: Maine Won’t Wait (Maine Climate Council, 2020). And while climate impact is increasing by most measures, around the world climate policy actions are lagging: after increasing worldwide on average by 10% from 2000 to 2021, they have leveled off to roughly 1% annual increases since (OECD, 2022). 

As the complexity of the world’s challenges increases, the number of students seeking 4-year undergraduate degrees worldwide is decreasing. A study by the Brookings Institution found that only 23% of high school students in the bottom quintile of poverty enrolled in a 4-year degree program within 18 months after expected graduation from high school (Reber and Smith, 2023). Furthermore, we have seen declining enrollment at 4-year institutions over the past five years. According to the National Student Clearinghouse, although the number of students pursuing bachelor’s degrees at public four institutions was slightly higher in fall 2023, it was still 5% lower than in 2018 (National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, 2023). 

Here in Maine, we have seen a decrease in the number of high school graduates attending 4-year institutions: The proportion of high school graduates attending a four-year college had hovered around 46% prior to the pandemic but dipped to 39% in fall 2022, the most recent year of data available (National Student Clearinghouse, 2023). We are at a moment when the need for talent, ingenuity, aspirations for peace and humanity, and solutions to endemic problems are priorities. How does our public university do its part?

Public land-grant universities that were initiated in the first Morrill Act were mandated to be practical, problem-focused, regionally oriented, and perhaps most significantly, to democratize education. The Morrill Act directed them to “teach agriculture, military tactics, and the mechanic arts as well as classical studies to members of the working classes could obtain a liberal, practical education” (APLU, 2012). What does the land-grant university of today and tomorrow look like? We should serve all students no matter their socioeconomic status, and we should continuously redefine what a practical and liberal arts education means. It seems clear that a reasonable starting point is to consider how to address the global challenges that affect our state. How do we ensure our students have the knowledge and skills not only to participate in that effort but also to lead civil discourse?

Depending on the year and the poll, Maine is the nation’s first- or second-most rural state (Maine Department of Health and Human Services, 2024; World Population Review, 2024). With this rurality come special challenges for higher education:

These challenges exist in the context of troubling demographics. Since 2012, the number of deaths in Maine has exceeded the number of births. We are an aging state: Approximately 22.5% of Maine’s population is age 65 or older, making us the “oldest” state in the U. S. – and that percentage is expected to exceed 30% over the next 15 years (Maine Department of Administrative and Financial Services, n.d.).

Will our research on aging, our preparation of health care providers, and our biomedical science and engineering succeed in making the difference our state will need? To respond to an aging Maine, the public higher education system needs to address the needs of Maine people for continued learning along their career and life span — intentionally and with relevance. In addition, it is critical to bring in learners from outside of Maine who might then stay.

Writing about the future of technology seems unwise, as its affordances and foibles change daily. Coupling the “regular” ongoing changes in the technologies that dominate every aspect of our society, with the disruptive effects of ubiquitous access to generative AI, higher education may need to take the leading role in this arena. As Forbes’ Nic Micanovic (2023) writes, “[T]echnological innovations are the most powerful driver of prosperity and welfare in history.” In 2023, there were more than 15 billion devices connected to the Internet Of Things (IoT) worldwide, with this number expected to double to more than 32.1 billion by 2030 (Statista, 2024). In 2020 alone, 466 million people used the internet for the first time, and that number is growing 6% per year. And yet in 2022, 2.7 billion people – one-third of the world’s population – had no internet access (Signe, 2023). 

Predictions about the use of generative AI suggest its ability to increase the global economy by trillions, save billions of work hours per year, help most workers be more productive in their jobs, change the nature of work, and accelerate learning (Chui et al., 2023). More than 37% of college students report having used ChatGPT for assignments (Intelligent.com, 2024). At the same time, the ethical and moral dilemmas it poses and concerns about the demise of liberal education are widely debated, along with whether technology will be a great equalizer or seriously exacerbate the already large digital divide.

For so many reasons, I believe a commitment to inclusion, access, and equity, and a recognition of the importance of the diversity that those dimensions bring to a university must also be central to our re-envisioning efforts. Every idea, proposal, analysis, and recommendation should use an equity lens as a frame. Deeply entrenched rationalizations and ways of doing business here, without bad intentions, can prevent us from being the inclusive and equitable institution we need to be in order to remain aligned with our land-grant roots.

The reasons for this commitment include a basic social justice argument and much more. Learners preparing to work in a global economy need to not only understand differences across peoples, cultures, governments, and values; they need every opportunity to learn through experiences of those differences in their education at UMaine. A third reason, promoted by researchers like Scott Page, is that the best solutions to challenging problems come when diverse perspectives, viewpoints, and experiences come together. And yet another reason ties all of these together: paraphrasing National Science Foundation Director Sethuraman Panhanathan, “[T]alent can come from anywhere [but] opportunity needs to be everywhere.”

Members of the UMaine Compass project (https://umaine.edu/compass/) proposed elements of a vision for the UMaine of tomorrow, and these three are resonating well with all groups:

These themes can be a framework for the change we must consider in our strategic re-envisioning as we reaffirm our leadership in teaching, research and public engagement for the next 160 years.