Madeleine Coles

News Editor

While many colleges at ISU are facing drops in enrollment, the College of Arts and Letters is expecting an eight to ten percent growth.

“Our faculty made the decision last year that our number one objective as a whole college was going to be enrollment,” said Kandi Turley-Ames, dean of the College of Arts and Letters. “So we’ve done a lot of community and high school outreach this year.”

Most of that outreach has been done through three programs: Liberal Arts High, Road Scholarship program and on-campus dual enrollment classes.

Liberal Arts High is an initiative started last year where ISU faculty members speak at local high schools and share their expertise.

According to Turley-Ames, the benefits of Liberal Arts High are two-fold.

“Students in high school get a better sense of what they would experience in college, and they actually have a relationship with a faculty member through the program as well,” she said.

Road Scholarships are given to local students nominated by their principals, although starting this year the nominations will be done by teachers. In the spring semester, the college gave away 14 scholarships worth $2,000 each.

“We made a big to-do about it,” Turley-Ames said. “We went into the schools with balloons or flowers, and we tried to celebrate their academic success in the same way we would celebrate the success of an athlete.”

Turley-Ames added that every Road Scholar, those who receive the scholarship, has attended ISU thus far.

This semester, the College of Arts and Letters is also allowing high school students to take classes on campus as a pilot program.

“High schools only have teachers that are certified in certain areas, so they don’t very often get to take a class in anthropology or information literacy at the college level,” Turley-Ames said. “So by opening up seats in our introductory courses, they get to have another college-level experience that might be more related to the kind of things they want to pursue when they go to college.”

To better expand and organize these programs, the college has also hired award winning dual enrollment teacher Holly Kartchner as the Director for Outreach and Retention. Kartchner looks at data the college has collected to reach communities, counties and schools that have not yet had any involvement with the College of Arts and Letters.

“The outreach part of my job is reaching out to students and local high schools and faculty and staff here to make connections and provide opportunities,” Kartchner said. “Retention is when we have students who come to ISU, to keep them in this college and help them find the right career path or college experience in the College of Arts and Letters.”

Turley-Ames added that Kartchner will be working closely with students within the college to ensure they have the best experience.

“She’s going to be working with each student as they come in, tracking them and checking on them and being a source of information for them,” Turley-Ames said. “I think that’s going to be critical.”

And it’s a job Kartchner is more than happy to be doing.

“I love the opportunity to continue working with young people and excited minds about education,” she said. “I enjoy getting to reach out and help people realize their dreams and that yes, this is the right place for them.”

According to Turley-Ames, in addition to outreach, the college has been attempting to improve the “reputation” of a liberal arts degree.

“I think all of that outreach has been huge,” she said. “I also think when we do that outreach, we talk about what people can do with a liberal arts degree. I think sometimes liberal arts has gotten a negative rap. But the skills that we teach are going to help you be successful in any and all jobs.”

She added that outreach and expansion was so important to the college because of the declining enrollment numbers in other areas of the university.

“We’ve seen a trend in southeast Idaho in particular where students aren’t going on to college,” she said. “So we thought this was a great opportunity to do some outreach and send the message to the communities that we serve that they have great opportunities for a college experience right here in their backyard.”