NDSU isn’t looking for much in a new President, just someone who isn’t Joe Chapman. They don’t even care if the new guy has a Ph.D! It doesn’t really matter if they know about education, or the research process, that’s not what the President does anyway. The President does important things like: Attend dinners! Fire their own bosses! Hire themselves bodyguards! And develop a healthy cult of personality around themselves!

This latest push to dredge the entire barrel, instead of just the top, is sure to pay off by delivering responsible leadership, right? After all, ANYONE would be better than the State Board homewrecker and diamond-crusted home builder that was Joe Chapman, right? Right?

It was outrageous when it cost $900,000. But guess what? It actually cost $1,470,000, and Joe “I want a bodyguard” Chapman is already living in it.

How does a project $600,000 over budget even get finished? Did the construction company lick its lips and forge ahead, assuming that the legislature would cave? Or did Joe Chapman raid NDSU’s general fund to make ends meet?

Either way, Joe Chapman seems to be able to get away with just about anything he wants, including firing his own boss. Don’t count on the State Board of Higher Education doing anything that might indicate the presence of a spine on Thursday.

North Dakota’s tuition rates have been spiralling upwards without any downward pull for the better part of a decade.  This year, the Legislature finally implemented an annual cap on tuition increases of 4%.  And thankfully, the State Board of Higher Education seems eager to aim lower than that – about 3.5%. While the difference is only about $30 a year at UND, every little bit helps.

Bismarck State College is teaming up with Halliday Public Schools to offer a college-credit welding program in Halliday.  (For those that don’t get there much, you can find Halliday at the edge of the Killdeer Mountains, where  Highway 200 meets Highway 8).

This is a positive step toward better education programs for the skilled trades and for higher education in southwest central North Dakota.

At the same time, North Dakota’s other campuses need to do a better job at providing vocational programs, and it’s high time for Beulah-Hazen to get its own college campus.

The Legislature is still taking a wrong-headed approach to its software needs, blindly assuming that after being cheated time and again by foreign software developers, that another one can solve its needs on-time and on-budget.  It’s now offering $3.2 million to an Irish company, whose nearest office is in Kansas.

Instead of dumping this money outside of our state and perpetuating our brain drain, why not spend that money expanding the state Information Technology Department, or a local company?  This (hopefully only) two-year project could create forty new programming jobs at $40,000 a year — and give some Computer Science graduates a reason to stick around North Dakota.

The bill to cover up the hiring process for University administrators has died!

Now we will be deprived of candidates who don’t want to suffer the embarrassment of not getting picked for the job. I think we’re better off.

There is something to be said for earning a decent living, but NDSU President Joe Chapman is living in territory far beyond that, on the backs of taxpayers and college students. He has a million-dollar home, a six-figure salary, and now, his own bodyguard.

It’s simply unprecedented for public figures in this state to take such extreme precautions. The excuse for this latest excess was an upset student barging into his home. Embarassing yes, but is he really in danger?

Chapman’s staff is either paranoid or not revealing the real reason why they are spending yet more of our money.

Last week, the Beulah school board narrowly voted to ban the 1994 novel “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” from its high school library; Last night, they held a public meeting on the action.

The BisTrib doesn’t discuss if the school is going to recant its censorship, but not doing so will reflect poorly on our state’s educational system.

North Dakota State University is carrying twice as much debt as five years ago – nearly $120 million.   This is a mere pittance compared to the state surplus.   Why not make them solvent?

Manitoba’s students held a sit-in at the legislative assembly to protest rising tuition rates, and the NDP government is taking notice.   Meanwhile in North Dakota, unless the legislature takes action,  tuition rates are set for yet  another year of increases.

An engineering student  at the University of Manitoba pays about CAD$5900 annually, while a similar student at the University of North Dakota pays  about USD$6800.   It certainly appears that even without a rate drop,  Manitoba is  putting forth the  funding to keep itself on the cutting edge.   Why shouldn’t we?

North Dakota has the money. It’s time to step up to the plate.