California State University officials announced a plan Wednesday that would combine the California State University Maritime Academy and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
“We looked very quickly at other CSU campuses," said Steve Relyea, CSU executive vice chancellor and chief financial officer. "But there really wasn't the synergy of academic programs that were so compatible as between Cal Poly and Cal Maritime."
Relyea says it came down to the need to address some financial challenges and declining enrollment at the small campus in Vallejo — the only maritime university on the West Coast.
“In fact, over the last seven years, their enrollment has gone down over 30%, and it was not a big enrollment to begin with,” said Relyea. “It started out before that decline. It started out at only slightly over 1,100 students, so now it's down to just over 700 students."
The CSU said in its announcement that Cal Maritime's financial challenges include rising employment and operational costs. The university has taken steps to address its fiscal crisis, but further budget cuts risk "compromising Cal Maritime's critical infrastructure and unique academic mission," the announcement said.
Cal Poly president Jefferey Armstrong announced the proposal to the rest of the campus in an email today.
Faculty members are trying to determine how the decision will affect the campus here.
“I really don't know enough right now,” said Seth Bush, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo professor. “I mean, I think it certainly extends the sort of the impact that Cal Poly might have, so from that perspective, it's pretty exciting. But at the other end of it, Maritime is a different kind of CSU and I don't know how well these will overlap.
Relyea says the next step will be to take the proposal to the 25-member CSU Board of Trustees.
“Now, what [CSU Chancellor Mildred García] will do is take this to our board of trustees in July as an information item for them to discuss and what we’ll do is that we’ll actually have two board meetings dedicated to that discussion,” said Relyea.
Students say they hope the integration benefits the campus.
“Hopefully the integration, you know, proves useful and proves well,” said Paul Tungol, a student at Cal Poly.
“I just think that it's probably a good thing,” said Cal Poly student Samuel Wemple. “Cal Poly is growing and I know it's been growing for a while, and, you know, looking forward to more and more people joining our school.
Relyea says the similarity of the two programs is why his office is proposing Cal Poly take over and the small number of students at the maritime campus won't affect the student body here.
“There won't be a negative impact because the students at Cal Maritime just first of all, their size is much smaller than the Cal Poly campus, and also the programs that they're in right now are, you know, programs like in engineering and the things that are related to ship operations and all of that are very much geared to those students,” said Relyea.
During its meeting in November, the CSU Board of Trustees will decide whether to move forward with the recommended integration of Cal Maritime and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
