Dickinson State University is becoming a “dual mission” institution.
"The western part of North Dakota is sparsely populated, especially with institutions of higher education," DSU President Dr. Thomas Mitzel said in an interview. "We're 100 miles from the nearest two-year institution, 200 miles from the nearest four year institution."
Mitzel said part of the mission of the North Dakota University System is to be able to offer education to people where and when they need it.
Mitzel said that means DSU will be offering everything from certificates to graduate degrees.
"We've been reaching out to our local industries, to determine what it is they need," Mitzel said.
Mitzel said DSU will be bringing forward a series of 7 or 8 programs this May.
"Many of them will be at the certificate level for now," Mitzel said. "But we hopefully will begin to integrate two year programs in the fall of 2019. We're pretty excited."
Mitzel said if students have to go away to get an education, they often don’t come back.
"We want to be able to educate people who want to work in western North Dakota, so that they don't have to travel or uproot their families and take years off," Mitzel said. "In many cases, we design the programming so they can keep working at their current jobs while obtaining their education."
The dual mission plan has been dubbed “University Plus.” Mitzel said the core mission of DSU doesn’t change, and the new two year and certificate programs will complement that.