An open letter to Gov. Bobby Jindal

Dear Governor,

Nicholls State University, like the other regional colleges, is between a rock and a budget. We have no control over our fate.

The budget, and the decisions you and the state Legislature ultimately approve, is yours to make. If it’s more cuts, every college will have to implement those changes. But how? Every college in the state will be placed in a position of failing their missions.

We employees at Nicholls understand that. What you and the Legislature need to understand, however, is that Nicholls, and schools like it, are not just the backbone of higher education in the state, they reach out and touch almost every aspect of economic life both in the communities and the state they serve.

What you need to understand is that eight out of 10 nurses in the River Parishes are Nicholls graduates. What you need to understand is that four out of every five teachers in the region are Nicholls graduates. What you need to understand is that Nicholls provides 4,600 jobs throughout Louisiana. What you need to understand is that for every dollar Louisiana invests in Nicholls, the state gets $8 in return.

If all the colleges in this state have the same dollar return, why cut off such a profitable spigot?

What you need to understand is that no university in the state serves its region better than Nicholls because no region in the state needs a university more.

For years the River Parishes were an isolated, provincial section of the state, happy that it was Cajun and country, relatively isolated, largely under-educated, hard working, both in fishing and in the oil patch. But that world has changed over the years, and this university admits more first-generation college students than any other in the state. Nicholls has not only grown with the region, it has significantly helped grow the region. Sixty years ago it was one building on the bayou. Now it is a campus of 7,000 students, most of which are much like their parents and grandparents, hard working and anxious to improve themselves. Many of these students hold down jobs while they go to school. Many live at home because they cannot afford to live in a dormitory.

Governor, this school and others like it, simply can’t take any more budget cuts. If you and the Legislature call for more cuts, the result will be catastrophic. Programs will be eliminated that should not be. Gifted instructors will leave the state because they have no alternative. Students who would have graduated will not. Instead of moving forward, this part of the state, as well as others like it, will shrivel up both economically and culturally.

Programs like Nicholls’ top-notch Biology Department will almost certainly shrink, which would affect the nursing program and slow the growth of that industry in this part of the state.

The same is true of the business world if departments in the School of Business are lost. The same applies to the School of Education. Programs like the Art Department, a first class department equal to any in the state, could be completely lost, as well as the nationally-accredited Department of Mass Communication, one of only four in the state.

Just because Nicholls is a relatively small school doesn’t mean it is not a great school. Just because it is a regional university doesn’t mean that it can’t, and doesn’t, compete with the best the state has to offer.

Students in art and music have considerably smaller classes than bigger programs in bigger universities. Quality over quantity is not a bad thing. This isn’t a weakness of Nicholls but strength. We know what we are – a teaching university. Certainly we have academicians who are nationally and internationally known, but our mission is to teach and we’re doggone good at it.

And when it has grown, Nicholls has done it the right way. Take the John Folse Culinary Institute. It is the only program of its kind in the state, perhaps in the entire South. It pays homage to the culture and food of the Louisiana. It graduates chefs and restaurateurs who add their talent to the cuisine of New Orleans, the region and beyond.

Governor, we at Nicholls understand all this. And we understand that the state is in a heck of a financial fix. But to cut higher education any more does a disservice to the state in such long term ways that you won’t be creating a brave new Louisiana, but a calamity that will make the disaster in the Gulf look like a springtime shower.