Portland, Maine

The ergonomic chairs, glass-walled conference rooms, ubiquitous technology and smell of new carpets and fresh paint scream well-funded startup.

And that鈥檚 what the Roux Institute is: a brand-new university campus backed by $200 million of donated money.

The institute, which opened last year in borrowed space with sweeping views of Casco Bay in Portland鈥檚 fast-developing East End, , certificates and professional training in computer science, data analytics, artificial intelligence, biotechnology, cybersecurity and other subjects.

These are hot fields in a state with a growing tech sector that , but whose existing colleges and universities collectively produced only 103 computer science graduates with bachelor鈥檚 degrees or higher in 2017 鈥� the last year for which the figures are available 鈥� including just 10 with master鈥檚 degrees.

鈥淣obody was servicing the need,鈥� said Chris Mallett, the chief administrative officer.

At a time when other higher education institutions are closing or merging because of a decline in the supply of high school graduates, the Roux is among a small but largely unnoticed number of new colleges that are opening.

Some are focusing on high-demand disciplines such as technology, health and alternative energy. Others are serving the huge number of older, working Americans who never went to college or didn鈥檛 complete a degree. Still others are trying to remake higher education with new models that forgo top-heavy bureaucracies and expensive campuses 鈥� models that in some cases don鈥檛 look like conventional colleges at all.

All three strategies are in large part a reproach to traditional higher education, which has often failed to provide the right programs to the people who increasingly need them.

It seems a bad time to start a university or college. Postsecondary , with , according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. In the last five years, more than 60 conventional colleges have closed, merged or announced they will close, including at least 13 since the start of the pandemic.

鈥淵ou get the combination of 鈥楾hat鈥檚 so brave of you,鈥� 鈥業t鈥檚 admirable鈥� and 鈥榊ou鈥檙e crazy,鈥欌�� Michelle Jones said of people who hear that she founded a new associate degree-granting college 鈥� Wayfinding College in Portland, Oregon.

Cost and red tape, including accreditation requirements, make it hard to start postsecondary institutions from scratch, and some that are planned have quietly moved back their opening dates.

But several have opened or are about to debut, some as independent experiments and others as offshoots of existing universities and colleges.

The Roux, for instance, was started after a Maine native, David Roux, chairman of the private investment company BayPine and cofounder of the technology-focused private-equity firm Silver Lake, offered $100 million to create a technology-focused university in his home state. A Maine-based foundation kicked in another $100 million.

Roux and his wife, Barbara, approached a dozen existing institutions and ultimately teamed up with Northeastern University to run the project, which was given temporary space in a tech company building on the Portland waterfront while it awaits the renovation of a historic B&M Baked Beans factory into its permanent campus. It reports enrolling 313 students this semester.

Foot traffic increases in the Portland space as night classes near for students who work during the days. There are high-tech glass-walled classrooms and a balcony with a view of passing fishing boats and ferries and corporate offices and condos under construction nearby. Inside, rough sheetrock is going up to create lab space, and there are still-unopened boxes of furniture.

Northeastern has also started campuses offering business and technology credentials in other cities with high demand for them but scarce supply, including Charlotte, North Carolina, and Seattle.

Also in Maine, Unity College  in the spring at a new campus that will award certificates and associate degrees to people who want to work in fields such as solar power. Demand for workers in solar  by 2030, according to an industry census.

Bristol Community College in Massachusetts is converting a former seafood packaging plant  scheduled to open next spring. The number of workers needed in the offshore wind energy industry , to 589,000, and increase to 868,000 by 2030, the consulting firm Rystad Energy estimates.

“Everybody agrees that our higher education system is broken. They might disagree about what needs fixing first. But everyone is aware of the brokenness.”
鈥擬ichelle Jones, founder of Wayfinding College in Portland, Oregon

Some of these new efforts are dramatically different from traditional higher education experiences, and their focus is almost entirely on nontraditional students.

The Rivet School, with campuses in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose and Richmond, California, provides personal coaching, financial aid, dedicated workspaces, group study sessions and career counseling to 164 adult students 鈥� a large proportion of them working and more than half of them parents or caregivers, the founders say 鈥� who take courses on their own schedules from two accredited nonprofit online universities.

Students graduate with a certificate of completion from the Rivet School. To them, it鈥檚 a college 鈥� the conduit through which they get degrees, even though the degrees are in the name of one of those two universities.

A program with intensive advising similar to the Rivet School鈥檚, called Duet, in Boston, resulted in graduation rates that , with no racial disparities, while cutting the cost of college in half, a Harvard study found. Duet students earn degrees online from Southern New Hampshire State University

鈥淭here鈥檚 a huge opportunity to rethink what the college experience looks like for all types of students,鈥� said Jeff Manassero, the Rivet School鈥檚 executive director. 鈥淲e鈥檝e tried to reimagine it for working adults.鈥�

At least 36 million Americans , the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center calculates. That鈥檚 a market nearly 10 times bigger than the number of people who  every year. Already, a quarter of undergraduates , the U.S. Department of Education reports.

But many of these adult students complain that conventional colleges fail to help them balance school with families and jobs.

鈥淚t was very much like a factory they put you in and put you through,鈥� said Chris Clausen, who started college after high school but never finished and now, at 29, has returned to take courses at the Rivet School toward a degree in business management.

In a knit cap and long-sleeve raglan T-shirt, Clausen was hovering over his laptop in the co-working space that serves as Rivet鈥檚 Richmond outpost, not far from the shipyard where women were recruited into service during World War II by a poster featuring the fictitious Rosie the Riveter, from whom the school took its name.

Working women and men alike need a way to finish their degrees, said Maria Ortega, 27, another student who was catching up on her homework there and who also works part time helping applicants through the admissions process.

Ortega started at a university right out of high school but quit after a year and a half.

At least 36 million Americans have started but never finished college.

鈥淚 did not feel supported. It wasn鈥檛 that it was hard to navigate; the professors post their office hours. It was just that when you were in their office hours they seemed like they were in a rush,鈥� Ortega said.

Longstanding institutions like the one she left 鈥渁re missing out. If they would pay attention to demographics like mine, they would be seeing so many people.鈥�

The Rivet School itself consists of an office big enough for four desks, a minifridge and some bookshelves. A coach was meeting with a student virtually behind a glass door decorated with a decal of a stylized Rosie the Riveter.

Thanks to one-on-one counseling like this, the dropout rate is a third lower than at conventional universities and colleges, according to figures provided by the school.

鈥淭here鈥檚 just a lot of hurdles in traditional colleges 鈥� financial aid and choosing classes and picking majors,鈥� said Chardonnay Hightower-Collins, another college coach at Rivet. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 why we exist. We鈥檙e filling the gaps from traditional colleges.鈥�

Back east, in Pennsylvania, college and university enrollment has  鈥� so much that the public university system is . Yet one Pennsylvania county in September opened its own new community college.

Erie County Community College, or EC3PA, has used federal pandemic funding to make tuition free and is offering courses and services virtually and in person at a vocational high school, branches of the county library system and an education center run by nuns.

鈥淲e鈥檙e never going to build some 800-acre campus,鈥� said Chris Gray, founding president.

EC3PA, too, focuses on students who its advocates say are not well served by existing universities 鈥� working adults with children, for example, or whose own parents never finished college.

鈥淲hat made me pack up my family and move and take a risk at a time enrollment鈥檚 been horrible is that we have to rebuild this system from the ground up and tear down those things that keep traditional higher education so elite,鈥� Gray said.

The county seat, the city of Erie, includes the poorest ZIP code in the United States; the median income is $10,873. Gray said he鈥檇 just gotten off a call with a prospective student who works at a McDonald鈥檚 and has no permanent address.

鈥淲e鈥檙e going to take the toughest students that no other institution would even look at,鈥� he said.

Two conventional Pennsylvania institutions have also added new schools and campuses. Lehigh University last year opened , a school of health that will teach such things as using data science to track and treat disease. And Harrisburg University of Science and Technology has  to teach computer science, interactive media and management, entrepreneurship and business administration.

“There鈥檚 a huge opportunity to rethink what the college experience looks like for all types of students. We鈥檝e tried to reimagine it for working adults.”
鈥�Jeff Manassero, executive director, the Rivet School

鈥淲e鈥檙e gluttons for punishment,鈥� said Harrisburg President Eric Darr, laughing. 鈥淵ou think about probably the most competitive higher education markets on the planet, you could probably pick Boston or Philadelphia.鈥�

But his university found it was accepting Philadelphia high school graduates who couldn鈥檛 afford, or didn鈥檛 want, to come to its campus in Harrisburg. So it took the education to them.

鈥淵es, there are world-class universities in Pennsylvania with hundreds of years head start on us. But they don鈥檛 focus on these kinds of students,鈥� Darr said. 鈥淪o we saw an opportunity, but we also saw a need.鈥�

The campus has about 60 students who, Darr said, otherwise 鈥渨ould not have gone to college. They would not have gone anywhere.鈥� Strapped for enrollment though they are, he said, other institutions 鈥渄o overlook potential students right in their own back yards.鈥�

Wayfinding College co-founder Jones previously taught organizational behavior and leadership at Concordia University Portland, which closed last year because of growing debt and declining enrollment. Even before Concordia shut down, she and others raised $200,000 to open Wayfinding, which offers one major, called self and society, meant to help students decide on what they want to do in life. It鈥檚 about to add a second major, in social change and civic action, which Jones said 鈥渟eems like a thing the world needs, but there鈥檚 not a lot of programs that connect people to that career path.鈥�

Wayfinding has 25 students 鈥� 70 percent of whom started but never finished at traditional universities, Jones said 鈥� making it part of a so-called micro-college movement that rejects huge, impersonal universities, even at a time when small colleges are struggling because of poor economies of scale.

Flagstaff College in Arizona, for example, also has only one major, sustainability and social change, and operates out of space on a community college campus. Other micro-colleges in various stages of development include Outer Coast in Sitka, Alaska, housed on the campus of a conventional college that closed in 2007, and Thoreau College in Viroqua, Wisconsin. These schools also have smaller staffs and lower overheads, with administrators often taking on several roles.

Two women, a former professor and a former nurse who earned a legal degree, are raising money  in Seattle by the fall of 2023 called Wright University, which they say will employ and enroll people 鈥渉istorically excluded by academia鈥� and have courses in 29 undergraduate and graduate disciplines.

These kinds of places are 鈥渇or folks who for whatever reason, and there are a lot of them, wouldn鈥檛 thrive in the traditional college model but still want college 鈥� students who are left out and fall between the cracks and are often ignored or discounted,鈥� said Jones.

鈥淓verybody agrees that our higher education system is broken,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hey might disagree about what needs fixing first. But everyone is aware of the brokenness.鈥�

Conservative founders and supporters of another just-announced institution, the University of Austin in Texas, say they will open next summer as a counterbalance to 鈥渋lliberalism.鈥�

Other institutions are moving forward with enhancements that will help them keep attracting students.

Wright State University in Ohio in September brought together health-related and education programs into  to focus on high-demand fields such as nursing and physical, mental and emotional health.

The University of Denver in October announced a new 724-acre campus in the Rockies to run outdoor activities for its students and programs in sustainability, environmental sciences and geography that were constrained by its existing urban location.

At a time when much of higher education is retrenching, 鈥淲hat we鈥檝e done is put a stake in the ground and said our future will rely heavily on excelling and standing out in the crowd in that student experience,鈥� said Jeremy Haefner, the chancellor.

鈥淭his is our blue-ocean strategy,鈥� said Haefner. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a sense of confidence and optimism that these changes in higher education don鈥檛 faze us 鈥� that we have a very solid strategy moving forward.鈥�

It isn鈥檛 easy to start a college. Unity鈥檚 new campus was scheduled for a September opening, which has been pushed back to the spring. A performing arts college planned by the nonprofit Norwalk Conservatory of the Arts in Connecticut announced plans to open in August 2022, but that has now been moved to 2023.

Nonetheless, Hightower-Collins, at the Rivet School, thinks the momentum will continue.

鈥淭hat鈥檚 just the nature of the world at this moment,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e鈥檙e finding all kinds of gaps in society, and you see so many startups popping up to address those problems.鈥�

This originally appeared at  and is published here in partnership with the .

鈥淚f someone didn鈥檛 call me a racial epithet,鈥� said Chong, who emigrated from South Korea in 1976, 鈥淚 was like, 鈥榃hat happened? Was there some kind of diversity training today?鈥欌��

Back then, says Chong, the school district was overwhelmingly white; he jokes that his family and their Vietnamese neighbor made up the district鈥檚 entire Asian-American population. But聽in 1980, Congress passed the Refugee Act, increasing the number of refugees the United States accepted each year and turning Portland into a resettlement site for those fleeing violence and oppression. Since then, the percentage of residents born outside of the United States has more than tripled, according to census data. Today, Portland鈥檚 6,800 students speak 67 different languages, and almost half are non-white. The percentage of students learning English is nearly twice that of New York City students.

The effects on the district and the city 鈥� not to mention the state, one of the nation鈥檚 whitest 鈥� have been both subtle and profound.聽Roughly 5 percent of students are homeless 鈥� nearly five times the statewide average. The district employs 12 full- or part-time interpreters, and a slew of nonprofit organizations like Welcoming the Stranger and the Immigrant Legal Advocacy Project offer support to immigrant communities.聽The ethnic potpourri has also turned Portland into an international foodie hot spot. Bon Appetit聽magazine named the city of 67,000 the聽, and the accompanying article highlighted a Vietnamese street food vendor and four Japanese offerings, including one that serves a Turkish crab dip.

But for minority students 鈥� whether they immigrated to the city recently or, like Chong鈥檚 two children, are second-generation Portland public school students 鈥� many aspects of school life have been stubbornly resistant to change. In every racial or ethnic group besides white, Portland students scored worse than their statewide peers on the 2017-18 math and science tests in grades 3-8. Just 11 percent of black high school students in Portland met or exceeded expectations on that year鈥檚 state math test. And, according to data presented at an August school board meeting, a multiyear effort to boost the performance of economically disadvantaged students and students of color has yet to yield significant progress.

Roberto Rodriguez, the chair of Portland鈥檚 board, called the continued achievement gaps 鈥渋ncredibly frustrating.鈥�

The diversification of Portland鈥檚 schools is an extreme version of demographic trends around the country. Between 2000 and 2015, the percentage of white students enrolled in public schools decreased in every region nationwide, and today the . But Portland鈥檚 huge influx of immigrants, many of them victims of significant trauma who arrive with very limited resources, has made the district鈥檚 experience especially pronounced.

Portland’s students include four children from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who left with their father after he was ; four children from Angola who by plane, bus, boat and horseback before coming to the U.S.; and three children, also from the Congo, who arrived after that included a four-day stretch without food.

鈥淚f you just look at where the conflicts in the world are and where civil wars are happening, pretty soon you’re going to see those people in Portland,鈥� said Grace Valenzuela, who immigrated to Portland in 1986 from the Philippines, where she worked as an English teacher in a refugee camp. She currently oversees the district鈥檚 Multilingual & Multicultural Center.

Living 鈥榯hat immigrant reality鈥�

Officials there maintain that they don鈥檛 have to make a false choice between students鈥� social-emotional needs and academics 鈥� the educational equivalent of walking and chewing gum at the same time. But after several years of targeted reforms, the district has more to show for its advocacy of immigrant students鈥� rights than for their academic progress.

If there鈥檚 a superintendent whose biography is supremely well-suited to tackling this conundrum, it鈥檚 Xavier Botana, whose family left Cuba in the aftermath of the Castro-led revolution when he was a year old, and eventually settled in the United States. Botana grew up learning English in schools in Illinois and Pennsylvania. He started his career as a bilingual and English-as-a-second-language teacher in the Chicago suburbs and went on to serve as an administrator in Chicago, Oregon and Indiana.

鈥淚鈥檝e always lived with the reality of not quite being from here and not quite being from somewhere else either, and having to live that immigrant reality, which I know many of our kids live with as well,鈥� said Botana, 57.

Botana became Portland鈥檚 superintendent 鈥� the district鈥檚 sixth in nine years 鈥� in July 2016, months before President Donald Trump鈥檚 election. His appointment came during the last term of former Maine governor Paul LePage, who boasted that when it came to divisive rhetoric and governing style, he 鈥渨as Donald Trump before Donald Trump became popular.鈥� LePage claimed that asylum seekers were 鈥渢he biggest problem in our state鈥� and referred to 鈥減eople of color or people of Hispanic origin鈥� as 鈥渢he enemy.鈥�

On the same day in early 2017 that Trump signed an executive order barring immigrants from multiple Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States, a Portland resident hurled racial slurs at high school students from Mexico, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo; he later threatened them with a screwdriver. Botana defended the students at a rally, and in he decried the 鈥渘oxious environment鈥� Trump had created for immigrants and people of color. He later worked with the school board to pass resolutions opposing xenophobia and Islamophobia.

Botana has also taken on national battles in support of Portland students.

One of those students was Allan Monga, who fled his native Zambia by himself and arrived in Portland in 2017, when he was 18. While he won鈥檛 disclose what led him to leave Zambia, citing his open asylum application, he acknowledged that he lived for a time in a teen shelter, where a caseworker helped him enroll in high school.

He found an apartment after six months. Once the social worker at Monga鈥檚 high school heard the news, she sent an email to colleagues providing a list of items that he still needed.

鈥淢y house was fully packed, fully furnished within a week,鈥� Monga said.

During that school year, one of Monga鈥檚 teachers encouraged him to participate in the National Endowment for the Arts鈥� Poetry Out Loud competition that invites students to study and recite classic poems. Intensely shy 鈥� 鈥淲hen I got on stage, I would literally drop the microphone,鈥� he said 鈥� Monga ultimately gave in to his teacher鈥檚 persistent urging. He went on to win the school competition, then the regional and state contests.

But as he filled out the paperwork to compete in the national championship in Washington, D.C., Monga realized that asylum seekers were ineligible. He told his teacher, and word got back to Botana. After negotiations failed to break the impasse, Botana directed the district to on Monga鈥檚 behalf, and won.

The student ultimately went to D.C., where he delivered renditions of works by W.E.B. DuBois and Lord Byron, but did not emerge victorious. 鈥淚 appreciated all of the hard work that everyone did,鈥� said Monga, who graduated in June. 鈥淭hey were in the forefront of making sure that I was not shut down.鈥�

Guarding against lowered expectations

Given the Portland community鈥檚 embrace of diversity, Botana says activism has been the easier part of his job. The persistent race- and economic-based achievement gaps, on the other hand, stand 鈥渋n stark opposition to what we want to be as a community,鈥� he said, and he has tried myriad strategies to boost minority students鈥� performance. Last school year, for instance, the district launched 鈥渆quity training鈥� for all instructional staff, more than 92 percent of whom are white. The training is designed to promote understanding and appreciation of people from different backgrounds and covers race, power and privilege.

鈥淲e have some of the most caring and committed educators that I鈥檝e ever been around, in terms of really wanting to do the right thing by our students, in particular our English language learners, our immigrant kids, our refugee kids,鈥� said Botana. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 awesome, and at the same time we have to guard against lowered expectations for those students. Part of our strategies include really giving our teachers the tools that they need to be able to keep an academic focus on students while at the same time addressing the traumatic effects in their [lives] that have brought them to us and challenge them every day.鈥�

Among the core of is proportional representation in Advanced Placement classes, eighth-grade algebra, the gifted and talented program and the special education program. The district aims to have the demographics of students in these areas reflect the district鈥檚 broader population.

At Deering High School, for example, which 鈥渟erves the most diverse high school student body in New England north of Boston,鈥� minorities made up 48 percent of the student body but only 12 percent of students in AP classes in 2015-16. So Deering tripled the number of AP classes it offered and individually recruited minority students to fill the newly created seats.

Assistant Principal Abdullahi Ahmed, a Somali immigrant, is among the officials who have personally encouraged students to leverage the school鈥檚 Challenge by Choice program, which lets a student take any course without completing prerequisite classes. The school鈥檚 guidance counselor concern about high stress levels for students who take multiple advanced classes, but the school partners with nearby Bowdoin College to support struggling students, and Ahmed says the effort is paying off: Minority students now comprise 41 percent of students in AP classes.

The district also changed the admissions criteria for the gifted and talented program, moving from a test that officials said disadvantaged English language learners to educator nominations that encourage the consideration of all students. (Botana is generally skeptical of standardized tests, 鈥渆ven moreso with our diverse students,鈥� he said.) Non-white student participation in the gifted and talented program increased from 13 percent in 2016-17 to 26 percent in 2018-19.

Overall, however, Botana said he was 鈥渘ot that impressed with our progress鈥� in achieving proportional representation. Specific data for class and program enrollment are not yet available, but he said the gaps in representation seem to mirror recently released state test results. In math and English language arts, the percentage of students from low-income backgrounds who met or exceeded expectations in 2017-18 was 38 points lower than the percentage of students from wealthier backgrounds who did so 鈥� meaning there had been no shrinkage in gaps that existed in 2015-16.

Based on his initial review of the yet-to-be-released data, Botana noted grimly that similar gaps exist between white and non-white students鈥� performance and in the enrollment of students in advanced programs and classes.

鈥淧roportional representation [is an area] where we should be able to see changes more rapidly,鈥� he said.

Botana said he has received no pushback to the changes he made to increase equity, but Doris Santoro, a parent of a Portland student who also chairs the education department at Bowdoin, said teachers can grow frustrated as specialized programs become more inclusive.

鈥淔or many teachers 鈥� this isn鈥檛 just Portland, but many teachers who teach in those upper-level tracks 鈥� the idea is, 鈥榃ell, if you get into this class, you better be able to do the work,鈥欌�� she said, 鈥渞ather than, 鈥榃e need to adjust our pedagogy and the kinds of in-school support we provide the students in order to access the curriculum and perform in the curriculum.鈥� For teachers who resist altering their pedagogy in the name of excellence, that鈥檚 an incredibly problematic stance.鈥�

Chong, who graduated from Portland schools and served on its board from 2002 to 2005, now has two children of his own in the public schools. He thinks teachers should hold the immigrant students to higher standards.

鈥淔or crying out loud, [some of the refugees] went from Africa 鈥� where there are no people like Mainers, they know nothing about Maine or Maine culture 鈥� and they come here in the dead of winter, where it鈥檚 minus 20 with four feet of snow, and we鈥檙e worried about pushing them? Are you kidding me?鈥� Chong said. 鈥淚 believe Xavier should be pushing back and telling the teachers, 鈥榊ou need to push these kids more.鈥� Their parents want them to be pushed. Don鈥檛 be so nice.鈥�

For now, Botana counsels patience, noting how few cities nationally have made significant progress in eliminating racial achievement gaps. The district is doubling the number of seats in its pre-K program and giving priority to students learning English. It is also investing in intensive coaching for literacy and other subjects as part of an increased budget voters approved earlier this year.

Ultimately, despite the limited progress to date, Botana remains optimistic that the Portland community鈥檚 efforts to support its immigrant students will eventually lead to more significant academic improvement.

“I don鈥檛 think that this is something that you can just snap your fingers and make it happen,” he said. “I think there鈥檚 significant work ahead for us.”