On Wednesday afternoon, May 24, Augusta University’s President Brooks Keel invited the public and staff to join him as he reviewed this year’s progress and future goals.
As the 2022-2023 school draws to a close for universities and colleges around the state, Keel highlighted major changes in the school’s budget and funding over the last few years, and several programs AU is developing to stand apart from the crowd.
Strategic investments of $34.7 million were divided amongst three areas over the last year; these areas of significance include about $4 million being invested in research, $9.2 million for institutional matters and upgrades and $21.5 million being invested into academic programs and student interests. With the University System of Georgia’s decision to decrease $66 million in state funding, the 2024 budget will suffer a 15.7% reduction – averaging around $10 million in total state funding.
However, Keel thanked Congressmen Buddy Carter and Sanford Bishop as well as Senator Raphael Warnock for securing funds for AU in spite of the budget’s dramatic decrease.
Regardless of the school’s decreased budget, AU has developed more online and in-person programs, dual enrollment courses and internship and scholarship opportunities for students, while also working to meet community needs for further health research and solutions.
The university has just announced its plans to partner with the Columbia County School District to bring at least one core dual enrollment course to all five high schools to combat the transportation barrier for some students.
“So many of our students just don’t have the ability to get to the campus on a day-to-day basis like they can to their high school,” Keel said. “This takes the dual enrollment process and places our instructors where the students are, and teaches the students within the high schools the courses that they need … it gives them course credit that they can transfer to anywhere they want to go.”
Similar to the current campus in Athens, Ga., a new partnership with Wellstar Health Systems will allow the university to develop an additional campus in Atlanta’s Wellstar Kennestone Hospital to accept more medical students and improve training.
“This will target areas of rural Georgia – specifically in Southwest Georgia – where we really need doctors the most,” said Keel. “[Georgia] is one of the sickest states in the country, and I mean that literally. We rank around 40th in just about every health concern you can think of … we’ve got to do something to address the health disparities in Georgia, and we’re fully committed to doing that.”
Along with the Wellstar affiliation, the university has also increased cooperation with Augusta Technical College in order to provide students easier credit transfer options, and further developed workforce education.
“College is not for everybody and technical college is not for everybody, but regardless of where you start, we want students to be able to pursue a career should they need to,” said Keel. “So the relationship we have with them now allows students to get their associate’s degree and transfer all those credits, [in order] to not lose all that time and money if they decide they want to get a bachelor’s degree.”
According to Keel, the addition of the university’s new School of Public Health, the launch of AU Online back in March and new partnerships with organizations, such as Wellstar Health Systems, will work towards the faculty’s lofty goal of obtaining 16,000 students by 2030.
With Fall of 2022 having over 9,500 students attending, Keel said the university has experienced an 18% increase in enrollment since 2015. However, one of the challenges the school is set to face is retaining students, and trying to gain more during a time of population decline.
“There just aren’t enough 18-year-olds anymore,” Keel said as he explained the increase in academic competitiveness among universities. “So, we’ve got to stand out from the pack; we’ve got to take advantage of the unique things we currently have … we have to be innovative in everything we do … and we’ve got to create an experience like no other.”
In order to retain students and prevent them from transferring, Keel said AU would be working on further developing community engagement, while focusing more on students’ needs and wants.
“It’s not about getting bigger just for the sake of getting bigger,” he said. “It’s about engagement … for us, it’s all about getting students’ foot in the door, and putting programs in place that will keep them here.”
Most surprising to Keel this past year was the development of AU’s new animation department which he believes is a major step in creating unique programs and opportunities at the university.
“This program is about combining art and technology, so it’s something we can use in the medical schools as well,” he said. “This isn’t your typical Disney World, Mickey Mouse animation.”
Additional concentrations the university will offer in the animation program will include: feature film and TV, marketing, interactive design and technical animation.
“The thing I’m most looking forward to are the programs I haven’t even been brought up to speed on yet – programs that faculty and staff are thinking about right now,” said Keel. “I have been so impressed with how our faculty have embraced this consolidation in really creative ways, and truly trying to find ways that they can bridge arts and science, humanities and technology. So the future of that is what I’m really excited about.”
