Will rural northern California university get a STEM upgrade?

California Governor Gavin Newsom announced this week his proposal to have Humboldt State University in Arcata (Humboldt County, population 132,646) become the third campus in the Cal Poly system.  The other two are in Pomona (east of Los Angeles) and San Luis Obispo, on the central coast, which is in a more rural area.  Andrew Sheeler reports on this development for the Sacramento Bee.    

Humboldt State University, located in Arcata on California’s North Coast, has faced declining enrollment numbers for years with fewer and fewer students opting for the remote campus in the redwoods.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, flush with a $76 billion state budget surplus, is backing a plan to turn the trend around by making the school a magnet for science and engineering students.

The $268 billion budget plan he submitted to lawmakers last month includes $433 million to transform Humboldt State into the state’s third polytechnic university.

Humboldt State University officials, lawmakers and area business advocates are confident that a coveted “Cal Poly” designation will entice students to head up north.

Sheeler's story quotes State Senator Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, “This is a game-changer for the North Coast."  

Humboldt State posted an enrollment of 7,923 in the 2015-16 academic year. The number fell every year since then, dropping to 5,600 students last year.

The school admits 92% of the students who apply to it, according to data kept by U.S. News and World Report.

Admission to the Cal Poly campuses in Pomona and San Luis Obispo is much more competitive.

This, from a February 2021 story in EdSource, details the existing strengths Humboldt State would be leveraging, as well as what might change with the Cal Poly designation:

The university already is reported to have the third highest percentage of students in the CSU enrolled in STEM programs — just behind Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and Cal Poly Pomona, officials say.

It continues a tradition of hands-on and field learning, another important trademark that sets a Cal Poly apart from regular campuses.

However, the campus does not offer traditional civil, mechanical or electrical engineering that are popular at other Cal Polys. All those may not be needed for a new type of Cal Poly as much as programs in health, sustainable agriculture, cybersecurity, fire protection and climate change, say advocates of the switch.

Mark Wilson, a biology professor who is vice-chair of the University Senate, noted that Humboldt’s location makes it a good place to expand biological sciences and applied sciences like forestry, wildlife and fisheries rather than try to replicate the other Cal Polys. “I don’t think either the goal or the vision is for us to become like them. The location here and the natural setting would really make a different university.”

Arcata, population 17,231, is part of the Eureka-Arcata-Fortuna Micropolitan area.  

Earlier reports on this development are here and here.  This is from the Humboldt area's Lost Coast Outpost.