Graduates of Bismarck State College throw their mortarboards in the air during a graduation ceremony in May 2024. The State Board of Higher Education is weighing a proposal that would allow state colleges and universities to offer reduced credit bachelor's degrees in an effort to recruit and retain more in-state students with a final decision expected in December. (Photo by Michael Achterling/North Dakota Monitor)
BISMARCK (North Dakota Monitor) — The North Dakota State Board of Higher Education is debating allowing state colleges and universities to implement reduced credit bachelor’s degrees with a final decision expected by the end of the year.
The new degree proposal would allow colleges to offer bachelor’s degrees with a minimum of 90 semester hours, which is 30 hours fewer than a typical four-year degree. Schools would need the board’s approval before offering a reduced credit degree.
During a board meeting Thursday, Deputy Commissioner Lisa Johnson, chief academic and student affairs officer for the North Dakota University System, said, as the proposal is currently written, it could apply to any bachelor’s degree program offered at state colleges and universities.
She added the Higher Learning Commission, which accredits colleges and universities across the U.S., said schools implementing reduced credit bachelor’s degrees need to be mindful of potential transfers, graduate programs and license requirements associated with the new degrees that could jeopardize state-to-state licensure compacts.
Johnson said only one public school, Yavapai College in Prescott, Arizona, was offering the reduced bachelor’s degrees and rest of the reduced credit offerings were at for-profit schools.
Levi Bachmeier, the new superintendent of the Department of Public Instruction in-waiting, embraced the idea and said state colleges and universities could do more to innovate new pathways for students.
“This would not require institutions to offer these reduced credit bachelor’s degrees,” Bachmeier said. “We are just allowing them to put an additional arrow in the quiver that I view it as an opportunity to retain and recruit more North Dakotans to get a quality education.”
Bachmeier was also supportive of a “warning label” being attached to potential degrees.
A draft label was included in the board’s meeting documents that read: “Students enrolling in a reduced credit bachelor’s degree program must be advised of the potential financial aid, academic, and career implications of obtaining a reduced credit bachelor’s degree.”
The North Dakota Student Association unanimously opposed the reduced bachelor’s degree proposal during a recent meeting, said Maxwell Eriksrud, a University of North Dakota student and student representative on the State Board of Higher Education.
“By reducing these requirements, I think you’re going to be reducing the actual benefit of college for these students,” Eriksrud said. “I think there is also a slight disconnect between admin and student concerns in this policy.”
Of the reduced credit bachelor’s degrees approved by the Higher Learning Commission, Johnson said the titles of the degrees are no different than a regular bachelor’s degree, but many of the reduced degrees appeared to be bachelor’s of applied science.
“As a board, you could designate that. You could require us to have something like that in the title,” Johnson said.
Valley City State University, Mayville State University and Bismarck State College all have programs outlined that would allow graduation with fewer than the traditional 120 credit hours.
Valley City State’s program to reduce the credit requirement to 106 credits – one less semester – for an education degree had already been approved by a committee, pending the board’s approval of the policy change.
Larry Brooks, vice president for academic affairs Valley City State, told a committee on Sept. 4 that the last semester would often be used for obtaining an extra endorsement, such as kindergarten or special education.
He said students could always come back to school to get that endorsement. He said having some professional experience would help students be more confident that seeking such an endorsement fits with their career goals.
Kevin Black, chair of the State Board of Higher Education, said the board is duty-bound to protect the best interests of students and, while his entrepreneurial spirit wants to try the reduced credit degree program at schools in the state, he thinks more guardrails are required before the policy can move forward.
“I would not want to send my son or daughter to an institution for a reduced degree and then totally blow their chances to get a job,” Black said.
The board voted to send the proposal to the Academic and Student Affairs Committee to provide more regulations surrounding the reduced credit degrees before the board takes up a revised policy in December.
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