County officials question future of UW campus

By Kevin O’Brien

Marathon County officials are questioning the future of the campus in Wausau and wondering what kind of longterm investments should be made in the county-owned facilities.

The topic first came up at an Oct. 24 meeting of the Human Resources, Finance and Personnel Committee after the UW System announced that it was closing two-year campuses in Washington County and Fond du Lac due to declining enrollment. The campus in Richland Center has also been shut down.

Committee chairman John Robinson said a recent discussion at the Wisconsin Counties Association made it clear that the remaining two-year campuses are inevitably going to be shuttered. Enrollment at UW-Stevens Point at Wausau has dropped from a peak of about 1,200 students in 2008 down to the current 368.

“We can’t be far off from that proverbial chopping block,” Robinson said, suggesting that the county board possibly invest about $50,000 into a study of the county’s options for the UW-SP campus. He noted that legislation has been introduced to provide grants for communities with two-year campuses.

“There are opportunities for us to plan for the future versus reacting like the other communities are,” Robinson said.

However, at the Nov. 2 meeting of the Extension, Education and Economic Development Committee, the dean of UW-SP at Wausau, Gretel Stock, assured supervisors that college administrators are not currently planning major budget cuts, staff layoffs or anything else that would fundamentally change its opera-tions. Other branch campuses in the UW System face unique challenges because of the way they are structured, she said.

“So, they’re in very different situations than we are here with our Stevens Point collective of campuses,” she said.

Stock said UW-SP, which oversees a second branch campus in Marshfield, is actually doing well compared to campuses in other parts of the state. She said enrollment is up 10 percent overall, though she acknowledged it was “slightly down” in Wausau and Marshfield.

Going forward, Stock said UW-SP is continuing to emphasize the importance of in-person instruction and is hiring a recruiter to focus on enrolling non-traditional adult students. She also noted that UW-SP operates with a “one university, three locations” philosophy so that students get the same curriculum taught by the same faculty, regardless of which campus they attend.

Stock said other UW locations have kept a sticter separation among their branch campuses, which has created financial challenges. “We have insulated against that from day one, knowing we are stronger together,” she said. When supervisor Tom Rosenberg asked what UW-SP’s plan is for reversing the decline in enrollment, Stock said the goal is to meet the demand for bachelor’s degrees, rather than focusing on two-year associate’s degrees, and to offer “adult-friendly” programs with flexibility in scheduling and curriculum.

Still, Stock said more potential students are choosing to attend four-year UW campuses, enroll in technical schools or simply enter the workforce directly because jobs are so available in the current economy.

“I don’t think any of our branch institutions will ever be at 1,400 students again,” she said. “That’s not our goal. Our goal is to serve the needs that are out there and work with the county on having the facilities that are appropriate for that offering. ”

For county officials, the question of how much money to spend on the UW campus is part of ongoing budget discussions.

Included in the county’s 2024 capital improvement plan is a $275,000 project to replace the burners in the central boiler that heats the campus. The replacements were originally part of a two-phase project that called for another $550,000 to be spent in 2025, but facilities manager Chris Holman said the second phase is not necessary to keep the campus usable.

“It removes any worries about getting through the winter,” Holman said.

County administrator Lance Leonhard said he and board chairman Kurt Gibbs have asked Chancellor Thomas Gibson of UW-SP to develop a “vision for the future” that takes into account its facility needs with a smaller student population. He said he expects the plan to include a significantly reduced footprint for the campus.

“It is not reasonable for us to maintain the square footage we have been because the student population is not there,” he said.

Stock said UW-SP administrators are currently doing a “deeper” analysis of their space needs, which they hope to have completed by the end of the year.

“I ask for patience on that data,” she told supervisors.

PROVIDING ASSURANCE - Greta Stock, dean of UW-Stevens Point at Wausau, is shown on the YouTube video of Thursday’s Marathon County Extension, Education &

Economic Development committee meeting. STAFF PHOTO/KEVIN O’BRIEN