New Partnerships
Dear Students and Colleagues,
I wanted to share some great news about the University’s recently established partnerships with two highly regarded institutions: Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), an R1 university that offers one of the top engineering programs in the Northeast, and Syracuse University’s College of Engineering and Computer Science.
In short, the new partnerships offer our undergraduate students seamless pathways to graduate study at these selective universities.
- Through our newly created Collaborative Accelerated Master’s Program (CAMP) with WPI, physics majors at Utica who complete the necessary prerequisites can get guaranteed admission to WPI’s M.S. in mechanical engineering program, which allows them to apply up to six credits they earn at Utica to their graduate degree.
- Similarly, through the Syracuse University Direct Admit Program, Utica students who earn bachelor’s degrees in a selection of majors can gain direct entry to complementary graduate programs in mechanical engineering, biomedical engineering, cybersecurity, computer science, and more.
These kinds of collaborative arrangements with other institutions offer us very promising opportunities to leverage our core strengths and provide our students with additional pathways to established and emergent professional fields that might not have been accessible to them otherwise. They allow us to concentrate on what we do best – delivering a high-quality, highly individualized educational experience at an affordable cost – while expanding educational opportunities for our students for graduate degree programs in high-demand career fields.
The WPI partnership is a great illustration of this. Students interested in a career in mechanical engineering may not have the financial means to start their journey as a first-year at an engineering school. Or, they may not know for certain upon entering college that they want to pursue engineering as a career pathway. Our physics program prepares students for a wide range of career pathways. With this collaboration, they now have the option to enter our excellent physics program, get the foundational learning they need, and earn guaranteed admission to WPI’s mechanical engineering program upon graduation.
As an institution, we do best when we strive to fully understand both our strengths and our limitations. We are a university that is sized right for the constituencies we serve; it makes sense for us to partner with institutions whose strengths complement our own rather than pursue expansion into certain disciplines and attempt to compete with well-established leaders in those fields. These collaborations offer a more sensible approach, and in my opinion, this is what we need to do if we want to offer our students outstanding opportunities and use our resources wisely.
We must seize the chance to capitalize on the changes that confront higher education, as they present an opportunity to do what our community has long excelled at – to work together creatively, with a renewed commitment to the students we serve. It is impractical – not to mention naïve – to imagine that Utica University can simply outcompete its way to success. Collaboration, combined with new ways of thinking, are key to meeting the challenges before us.
Utica University has long sought solutions and new ideas through partnerships with other academic institutions and industry. The new relationships with WPI and Syracuse represent an enormous step forward, and we will continue to seek collaborative opportunities that advance our mission of serving students and strengthen the University moving forward.
Sincerely,
Stephanie Nesbitt
President