PATRICIA L. PRADO-OLMOS VICE PRESIDENT OF COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT
CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY SAN MARCOS
One of the first calls Ellen Neufeldt made last summer when she learned that she had been appointed the new president of Cal State San Marcos was to the university’s first president, Bill Stacy. Neufeldt happened to know Stacy already, as their paths crossed when both were leaders at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. They talked about how special CSUSM is, and Stacy shared his memory of visiting the site of the future campus back in 1989.
Recently, more than six months into Neufeldt’s tenure (30 years after the university’s founding) Stacy was the one who called Neufeldt. Neufeldt told him that she knows she’s standing on the shoulders of giants – not only Stacy himself but fellow former presidents Alexander Gonzalez and Karen Haynes. “Over the last three decades, our university has discovered and honed its voice, its place, its mission,” Neufeldt said Thursday morning. “Now it’s time to ask: What do we want the next 30 years to look like?”
Neufeldt was speaking at her first, and CSUSM’s 16th, Report to the Community, an annual tradition in which the president spotlights the university’s achievements to a broad cross section of regional business, nonprofit, education and government leadership. The sold-out event this year featured nearly 600 attendees. Because it was her inaugural Report to the Community, Neufeldt not only reflected on the many things she has discovered as part of her ongoing Listening and Learning Tour, she also laid out her vision for CSUSM as it moves forward into the next stage of its evolution.
“This semester, we will begin a university-wide strategic planning process, and I want you – our community – to be a part of helping us envision and lay the groundwork for our next 30 years,” she said.
Touching on her background as the daughter of parents who worked in higher education and a father who was a first-generation college student, Neufeldt emphasized her lifelong focus on student success, “from first point of contact to graduation day and beyond.”
She reinforced the importance of diversity, inclusion and social mobility, pointing proudly to a 2019 ranking in which CSUSM placed 36th out of almost 1,500 schools nationally in the Social Mobility Index by CollegeNET. “This means we are one of the top universities in the country when it comes to educating more low-income students at a lower tuition and graduating them into good-paying jobs, prepared to lead in the world of tomorrow,” Neufeldt said.
Fitting in a speech to vital community partners, Neufeldt highlighted the necessity of community-engaged learning centered on mutually beneficial collaboration between students and partners. Last academic year, she noted, CSUSM facilitated more than 2,600 community-engaged learning opportunities at over 500 community businesses and organizations. “Based on what I’ve observed and heard,” she said, “I think this campus is second to none in this kind of out-of-classroom learning experiences we are providing our students.”