Questions Arise Over Beach Plan for University

By MATTHEW BOWERS

BY MATTHEW BOWERS

THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT

“Virginia Beach University” makes sense to a lot of the city’s political leaders. The state’s most populous city needs and deserves its own college, they argue.

But on the heels of a state delegate’s proposal last week for a study of the school’s feasibility, some education and business experts question the need.

“I haven’t heard a word about” Virginia Beach as a potential site for a new college, said Larry Goldstein, a nationally active higher- ed strategy consultant based in the Charlottesville area.

“I was a little surprised, actually, because you have ODU and Norfolk State and, if you expand it, Christopher Newport. … If you want to go to school in the Tidewater area, you can go,” Goldstein said.

Expect some universities to object to diffusing limited state education money for a new school or branch campus, he said.

“I don’t think this is going to get a lot of support outside of the Tidewater area,” Goldstein said. “Or more specifically, outside of Virginia Beach.”

Last week, t he State Council of Higher Education voted to support legislation calling for a study of whether a new public four- year college in the Beach is feasible. Del. Bob Tata, R-Virginia Beach, had proposed the study in a resolution, HJ625. If the General Assembly approves it, the s tate c ouncil staff expects to complete the study in six to nine months.

Virginia Wesleyan College and Regent University, both private schools, are based in Virginia Beach. Several public and private schools also offer college courses in the city, including Hampton University and Old Dominion and Norfolk State universities. The two Norfolk schools share the Virginia Beach Higher Education Center off Princess Anne Road.

The business community is happy with the services provided at the center and at the Tidewater Community College branch next door and has seen no “real groundswell” for a separate college, said Ira Agricola, senior vice president of the Hampton Roads Chamber of Commerce.

“What we’re interested in is delivering these classes in the most efficient way,” Agricola said. “If the study points up that a four- year campus is the most efficient way to do that, then we’ll be on board.”

Robert Goodman Jr., an attorney active in Beach civic affairs, said a few quality schools can do more good than having smaller ones in each city, as long as they can handle the demand.

“In all issues, we should think regionally in this area, and not parochially,” Goodman said. “And the city boundary line is the least important issue. Convenience to students is important.”

Still, convenience is one reason Mayor Meyera Oberndorf and other leaders back the city having its own school.

“I think it’s very unfortunate that a city of 400,000 people, we have to drive … into Norfolk to attend a four-year school,” said Daniel Edwards, chairman of the Virginia Beach School Board. “It’s not very fair to a city our size.”

In the interim, Edwards would like the state to relent and allow ODU to offer more lower-level courses at the Beach center it shares with Norfolk State. Tata last week also proposed a bill, HB3018, that would give ODU “emergency” authorization to provide such classes there.

ODU typically offers graduate and upper-level undergraduate courses at the Beach center. Its attempt this past year to teach a fuller range of classes has resulted in complaints from Tidewater Community College, which provides first- and second-year classes at its Beach branch. That prompted an ODU standoff with the State Council of Higher Education , which has said it must approve such classes.

The squabble is what Tata said pushed him to ask the General Assembly for the study of Virginia Beach’s higher-education needs.

Among the state’s major public colleges, only ODU has publicly indicated it may be interested in building a full campus in Virginia Beach.

“No plans, no interest – there’s nothing,” said Carol Wood, spokeswoman for the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. Her school already has a branch, the College at Wise. Similar non interest was expressed by officials at the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond and Virginia Tech in Blacksburg. Carolyn Meyers, president of Norfolk State, said her staff has discussed the possibility of a non traditional campus at the Beach that would emphasize distance learning through computers.

George Mason University in Fairfax, which has two branches in Northern Virginia and is working on a third, waits to be asked by community leaders, spokesman Daniel Walsch said.

“If there was a genuine interest, we would sit down and talk with them, at least,” Walsch said.

ODU President Roseann Runte said she’d have to consider pursuing a full-blown branch campus in Virginia Beach, if a need was shown and funding made available.

“One also has to consider that 30 percent of our students come from Virginia Beach and Chesapeake. … So we are their university already,” Runte said.

Recent state history indicates that new colleges spring from branches of old ones. Each of Virginia’s four most recently created public universities – ODU, Norfolk State, George Mason and Christopher Newport University in Newport News, started as branches of other schools.

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Reach Matthew Bowers at (757) 222-3893 or matthew.bowers@pilotonline.com.

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