Bodhi Haugen
On Aug. 30, Cal Poly Humboldt (CPH) received an award for serving rural students and having one of the highest graduation rates in Washington Monthly’s Best Colleges for Rural America. CPH was awarded eighth place out of 100 schools this year. The Washington Monthly is one of the few outlets that specifically ranks rural schools in America, considering all economic classes and GPAs.
Humboldt County is considered a non-metro area, meaning a region that lies outside the boundaries of a large city and contains no continuous urban city center with 50,000 or more residents. The Washington Monthly considers higher education, like CPH, as pillars of local tax bases, essential infrastructure for rural communities and anchors of civic life.
Gillen Tener Martin in the Washington Monthly Best Colleges for Rural America said, “To get on the list, colleges must be located in rural areas and not be highly selective in their admissions policies. To do well on the list, they need to recruit and graduate large numbers of in-state students of modest means with degrees that earn higher salaries than would be predicted given the students’ demographics,” Tener Martin said. “Colleges get extra credit if they grant large numbers of degrees in fields that are in high demand but low supply in rural areas—like teaching, nursing, engineering, agriculture and natural resources management—and if their graduates stay in the state rather than taking their skills, and the tax dollars that paid for them, elsewhere.”
Alex Rossi, a freshman in forest hydrology, has lived in Humboldt since his freshman year of high school and has preferred it over their previous home.
“Fresno is a one and a half million person beige suburb, 110 degrees in the summer, yeah, the air always smells like smoke, and here is pretty much as far from that as you can get. The air is always clean. There’s green everywhere. Kind of feels like you’re in the redwoods even when you’re on campus,” Rossi said.
Sean Harwood, an energy systems engineering major, came to Humboldt from Concord, CA.
“I spent a few years in community college. I was participating in their engineering technology program before I moved up here. I had the choice between here and Bakersfield. Glad I chose what I did. Harwood said. “I do appreciate the additional amenities, the library especially, and the free bus services I enjoy. That’s something we didn’t really have at our community college.”
The Washington Monthly recognizes that rural colleges commonly experience lower admissions which leads to shrinking tuition revenue, downsizing in staff and less amenities. One of their goals for this ranking is to address the fact that the current higher education system is broken, but that this list can help make the system worth fixing for future leaders.
Bodhi is a reporter and news editor for the Lumberjack. You can reach him at bgh27@humboldt.edu