WSU Trending Topics

Public-private partnerships, known as "P3s," are a well-established method for universities needing to secure alternative funding, and they are not new to higher education nor to Kansas. P3s are all around us, in research collaborations, bond financing, tax incentives and investments.

A new partnership between Wichita State University and McConnell Air Force Base will provide military personnel the opportunity to work toward their bachelor's degree while on base. Those with a military ID can take courses toward seven undergraduate degrees. Each military student has the option to utilize the Tuition Assistance program offered by McConnell's Education Office.

Starting fall 2018, students were able to take advantage of the new affiliation between Wichita State University and WSU Tech – formerly known as Wichita Area Technical College.

While the two remain separate degree-granting institutions, the formalized affiliation now allows for more collaborative possibilities, as well as increased availability and quality of opportunities for students, while directly meeting the core workforce needs of the state.

On July 12, WSU launched a website redesign that holds tremendous promise for the university in supporting our enrollment and marketing efforts. Concurrent with the new design, we also launched a new content management system (CMS) and a new interactive campus map and virtual tour platform. This complex project — on which work continues daily — involved the migration of roughly 15,000 pages of content from our old site, pages which were generated by an unsustainable and unsupported 15-year-old content management system called Department Tools (DT).  

In 2017, we were approached by creators of a new private school about leasing space on campus for their startup school. The goal for their school is to challenge children to use critical thinking, creation, collaboration and innovation in their education. We were intrigued by the concept that would focus heavily on experience-based learning – a concept consistent with the mission of Wichita State.  

With the rising costs of higher education and state funding still well below previous years, the university requested an increase in tuition for 2019 of 2.5 percent. Despite the increase, Wichita State still has the state's lowest tuition.