Enrollment rates have declined since 2010 and there’s an estimated one million dollar budget shortfall, but Northwest Technical College has a plan. NTC is calling it a master academic plan, and it’s part of the college reinvention process they started last year. The plan involves six goals to enhance programming, improve community connections, and achieve financial stability, and officials are calling it transformational. “Transformational in the sense of cementing these relationships with the community, transformational in the sense of creating new pathways between two-year schools and four-year schools … and transformational … in the sense of having a responsible and sustainable budget,” said BSU President Richard Hanson.

The changes in programming will come with a change in image, with a new identity and a new name. They say the new name will most likely be announced in the spring, but other parts of the plan, like more community partnerships, are already in motion. The plan will be put into effect with different initiatives each month, but major changes to programming will start in the fall of 2015.

By — Lakeland PBS

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