The Nebraska State College System (NSCS) recently announced that they had selected a new chancellor. The new chancellor is Paul Turman, who has previously been one of the Board of Regents in the state of South Dakota.

Turman will be part of a group of people that will try to make sure that state resources are being used adequately and effectively and that they are not making duplicates of programs that are already held at other educational institutions (or at least ones that are not necessary for each state school). The Board of Trustees also works with the chancellor to set goals for the system.
On top of all of that, Turman said that his job will additionally make him have to work with the state legislature.

“Whether it be advancing the argument for more resources or maintaining the resources that you have,” Truman said. It’s also working with them on legislation that may have an adverse impact or positive impact on the students at the respected campuses within the system.”

Turman’s biggest accomplishment in the state of South Dakota while on the Board of Regents was four years ago. Redoing the general education credit hour requirement down from 41 credit hours to 30 credit hours.

The South Dakota Board of Regents (overseeing five different campuses) had requirements for both the institution and system general education requirements. One of the biggest issues with this was that they had students that were transferring to different colleges and transitioning within those colleges, and many of the student’s earned credits would not transfer over to another one or “not transferring over the way we hoped.”

There were some students that were trying to complete degrees for two different institutions at the same time and the South Dakota general education requirements were limiting students abilities to finish their degrees in four years.

“We’re actually doing a much better job of actually assessing our general education curriculum, looking at that more routinely, and allowing for better seamless transition for students in the state of South Dakota as a result of that project,” Turman said.

Turman has also worked on things like remedial classes and getting them structured so that the classes prepare the students for the classes that will count for college credit Truman said. A reason for that is that if you are taking one of those classes, whether it be in subjects of math or English, you have a 25 percent higher chance of not graduating from college (in the state of South Dakota) if you come in needing remedial courses.

Turman, in an interview with the Norfolk Daily News said that one of his priorities is going to be focusing on time-to-degree. This means that the NSCS would like to focus on getting students out as quickly and as efficiently as possible. This is a big deal for students today since it seems as though we are always being asked to do more but then to have the idea of the “four-year plan” sort of slip away from us.

Turman recommends that students shouldn’t do anything like take 12 credit hours in a semester unless they are going to take courses over the summer semester.

The reason for this is that students should be taking at least 15 credit hours a semester so that they can graduate on time in four years. Two semester of 15 credit hours each is 30 credit hours, multiplied by four years is 120 credit hours total.

When it comes to college being affordable, Turman points out that a big reason why students are having to spend so much money on college is that they are having to take more than four years simply due to the fact that they don’t have enough credit hours. They may have had one or multiple semesters where they took less than 15.

They may have had one or multiple semesters where they took less than 15 credit hours.

“If you took five years to graduate, rather than four, you have to look at what the yearly cost of going to school is.”

This could be such as tuition, student fees, room and board, etc.

The other reason students are spending more than four years in college is that they often change their majors. Some students change it just once, while others change it multiple times during their time at college, which prolongs the student’s time in college.

Turman will begin serving as chancellor for the NSCS on January 2, 2018, where he will oversee all three Nebraska State Colleges (Chadron State, Peru State, and Wayne State College).