News

(with apologies for any unintentional errors, due to the small timeframe for writing this, as well as apologies for this being far too long, except for the very few interested in the details)

Hello. I am Steve Easton, DSU class of 1980. For the past 4.5 years, it has been my honor to be the President of Dickinson State University.

DSU holds a special place in the hearts of Easton family. Four generations have graduated from DSU. My grandmother, my father, myself, and most recently my son.

When I am asked why DSU is so special to us, I think of the lawyer Daniel Webster, who once had to defend a different small college, his alma mater, before the U.S. Supreme Court. The continued existence of that college, Dartmouth, was in doubt because it was under major attack in a legal proceeding that was designed to shut it down.

Webster concluded his argument to the Chief Justice as follows: “Sir, you may destroy this little institution. It is weak. It is in your hands! . . . . It is, Sir, as I have said, a small college, and yet, there are those who love it.” See https://www.americanheritage.com/it-small-college-yet-there-are-those-who-love-it

Dickinson State is but a small college, and yet, I love it. Many others do, too. We love what it does for its students. It gives them a special, caring place to grow into their careers. Those current students, love it, too, like we past students do. Despite turmoil between some in the faculty and administration, this is still a very special place to be a student.

I took this job to defend DSU, and especially its students, against all threats, including financial threats. When I was one of those students over half a century ago, I benefitted from the efforts of those who fought to preserve Dickinson State for me. To this day, I remain thankful for them.

When I took this job, I made a vow to myself that I would fight to preserve DSU for our students, both those here now and those who, if we can preserve it, will come later. I did not come here to keep things the way they were, because at that time DSU was on a path to financial disaster that threatened the future of the university. As the faculty will attest, I did not come here to make life comfortable for faculty, though I have tried to support them as much as possible. I did come here to do whatever I could for students, including what needed to be done, even though unpopular, to keep DSU here for future students.

Now the North Dakota Board of Nursing has told me that I cannot fight for our students, that I cannot even look for new Nursing faculty members. Here is the bottom line: The North Dakota Board of Nursing has prohibited me, and the other administrators at DSU, from even trying to find new faculty members for DSU’s Nursing students.

If I cannot do whatever I can for students, including looking for faculty members so they can continue their education, I cannot do my job, because fighting for students is my job. Therefore, I have informed the Chair of the North Dakota State Board of Higher Education and the Chancellor that, after a short and orderly transition that we will arrange, I will no longer serve as President of DSU.

Here are some details, as I understand them, on the Board of Nursing’s action. I say “as I understand them,” because, unlike others including DSU’s former Nursing Director who apparently were interviewed, I was not even given the courtesy of being interviewed by anyone at the Board of Nursing before the Board’s Education Division hastily made its findings.

First, as you may know, all seven of our former full-time Nursing faculty have resigned. I did not ask for any of those resignations, nor did I want them to occur.

But I did realize that the Nursing faculty believed that the production guideline of 160 credits per semester should not apply to them. That guideline establishes that DSU faculty should teach an average of 13.3 students per class. Not 13 or more students in every class. An average of 13.3 per class. Thus, for example, if a DSU faculty member had 8 students in one class, that faculty member would need to have about 19 in another class. That would be an average of 13.5 for those two classes. In my view, that is not an unreasonable standard. It does not require the kind of large classes that would prevent DSU from being the student-friendly environment that we treasure. But that standard does lead to economic viability for DSU.

This standard applies to the DSU faculty as a whole. I adopted the standard, as well as other policies, to encourage our faculty to recruit and retain students, including by working with those students who might struggle and need extra help.

Why did I adopt standards to encourage faculty to recruit and retain students? First, because I believe in what DSU provides to students. I want as many students as possible to have the benefit of a DSU education. Second, those standards will bring economic stability to DSU, to keep us around for future students.

The Nursing faculty has made it clear to me, repeatedly, that they do not believe these standards, that apply to all other DSU faculty, should apply to them. That is the rub. Contrary to the Nursing faculty’s view, I believe standards should apply to all faculty. In my view, making special rules for some of the faculty is a path to substantial morale problems for a university. So I stood firm, not granting the Nursing faculty’s request for special treatment. And every member of the Nursing faculty refused to sign a contract with that standard that applied to all other faculty members. And they had every right to do so, although doing so did create a problem for our Nursing students.

Within one day of receiving the last of the resignations, including the resignation of our former Nursing Director, I advised the North Dakota Board of Nursing of our efforts to rebuild our Nursing faculty. Here is what I told the Board of Nursing in my July 10 (emailed) letter about what we were doing for our Nursing students: 

• “The next business day after receiving the notice from the nurse administrator, e., today, we worked to post vacancies for all seven positions.”
• “Additionally, we have been actively contacting local professionals who are currently licensed by the Board of Nursing in the state of North Dakota.”
• “In addition to actively working in a concerted effort to hire full-time and part-time qualified nursing instructors, we are seeking assistance from our sister institutions in the NDUS.”

In summary, the other DSU administrators and I were engaged in an effort to NOT stop our Nursing students’ education, despite the resignation of seven faculty members, by finding others to teach the courses that our former Nursing faculty would not be teaching. I remain proud of those efforts to protect our students.

Two days later, on Friday, without ever even interviewing me, the North Dakota Board of Nursing’s Education Division prohibited us from working for our students. The Board of Nursing’s July 12 document states: “[T]he letter from the President of Dickinson State University dated July 11 [sic], 2024, provides evidence of noncompliance with the requirement of having the nurse administrator provide oversight of the faculty recruitment process begun by DSU in an effort to restaff open faculty positions without first having a nursing administrator in place, counter to the requirements set forth in Subsection 5.”

This means I cannot work on behalf of DSU’s students, by trying to find them new Nursing faculty. If I cannot work for DSU’s students, I am no longer a benefit to DSU. So I will step aside.

Also, as the North Dakota Board of Nursing probably realizes, though perhaps not because it did not interview me, it is not humanly possible to hire a nurse administrator quickly. In the first place, as a public institution DSU is required to form a search committee and have that search committee rate the written applications, for any position. Then interviews must be conducted of those who receive the highest scores from the search committee. After the interviews result in a decision about whom to offer a position to, we are required to have a background check completed. That may be too many rules for a situation like the one we are in, but those are the steps required by the North Dakota University System’s rules and procedures.

After all of that happens, many candidates are not able to start immediately, because they are in other positions and may have to move. The whole process is even harder for the nurse administrator position, because the accreditation standards call for that position to be held by someone with a doctorate in Nursing. All in all, it would take, at the very least, two to three weeks, but possibly longer, for us to hire a nurse administrator. Thus, now that the Board of Nursing has prohibited us from even contacting potential faculty members until a nurse administrator is hired, as a practical matter we cannot even try to fill the open positions with new Nursing faculty.

So what option does that leave DSU? As the Board of Nursing probably knows, though I cannot be sure because I was not interviewed, we might be able to hire back the former Nursing faculty, starting with the nurse administrator. The extensive search process I have outlined above generally would not apply to hiring back our former Nursing faculty.  Because those individuals presumably have already been through the search process, NDUS/SBHE policies and procedures allow them to be hired more quickly. Thus, under the North Dakota Board of Nursing’s hasty action, the only realistic option for us to provide a Nursing education this fall to our students is for us to hire back the former faculty that created the entire problem by resigning their positions at DSU.

Though I am extremely troubled by the Board of Nursing intervening in an intramural dispute at one small university’s nursing program, I am now stepping aside to allow the re-hiring of the former Nursing faculty, if other officials at DSU decide that it is in the best interests of DSU’s students to do so. While I will not sign my name to such contract offers, I certainly would understand, and will not criticize, the decision of others to do so, to protect our students’ education from the actions taken by the North Dakota Board of Nursing. The Board of Nursing has forced DSU to make a choice between the interests of our current students and the interest of DSU’s future students, including but not limited to future Nursing students.

If you are interested, please allow me answer a question, though not with every relevant detail because that would take far too many pages, that I have been asked several times in the past few days: Why did I insist upon faculty contracts, including for Nursing faculty, that require faculty to produce enough credit hours to lead to financial stability for DSU?

Part of that answer is in the basic statistics of the DSU Nursing program. Before the recent resignations, DSU had seven full-time Nursing faculty members. In our last graduating class two months ago, we produced 16 students eligible to take the Registered Nurse exam.

The simple reality is that, though we love DSU Nursing and want to help it survive, we cannot spend over half a million dollars in compensation expenses for 16 Registered Nurses. That does not work financially.

Because of this reality, the DSU administration has been working hard, for several years, to encourage DSU Nursing to innovate—i.e., change—so it can be successful. A big part of the problem, at least in my judgment, is that it takes four years to become an RN at DSU, but only two years at many other ND institutions. It is very difficult to convince a potential student that they should spend four years at DSU to become and RN, when they can become an RN in two years at many other institutions in North Dakota and elsewhere.

Part of the concern, to be sure, is financial. In my opinion, we cannot continue to run a program where seven full-time faculty members produce only 16 RN graduates.

But this is not just about finances, though that is an important part of this. Because I love DSU and I believe it provides such great opportunities for students, every time a Nursing student drives past DSU on I-94 to get to one of the many campuses that offers him or her a two-year RN degree, it breaks my heart. I believe in DSU and what it does for students, so I want that Nursing student at DSU.

So we in administration have urged our faculty to change. I will admit that I have led that effort, working as hard as I can to convince DSU’s Nursing faculty to change to a two-year RN program, followed by a four-year Bachelor’s degree. I have never sought to stop the four-year bachelor’s program, because we want as many as possible here for four years, but I have definitely worked to get our students their RN degrees in their first two years.

In my time as DSU President, I have met with Nursing faculty more times than I met with the faculty in all other disciplines combined. We have also supported Nursing financially, both by fundraising for Nursing scholarships and by spending $750,000 to renovate the Nursing simulation lab. Other than a very generous private donation and some other gifts, for which we are very grateful, those are DSU funds that could have been used elsewhere.

Despite my efforts to support Nursing faculty to motivate them to convert to a two-year RN program that could compete effectively with those at other schools and therefore keep DSU Nursing alive and well financially, I have failed miserably. In fact, when I realized just this spring that our continuing efforts to convince Nursing to make this change were doomed, I switched strategies to boost DSU Nursing’s financial stability.

On May 8, I advised DSU Nursing faculty that I would no longer require the change to a two-year RN program. At the same time, I reminded them, though they already knew this from attending previous meetings open to the entire DSU faculty, that the credit hour production guidelines applicable to all DSU faculty would apply to them. The DSU Nursing faculty found it unacceptable to have the rules that will apply to all DSU faculty apply to them.

So here we are. I won’t back down, because I want DSU to be here for future Nursing students, and for future students in Teacher Education, Science, Business, History, and many other fields. I have spent my days and nights fighting for all of those students, including by trying to motivate our faculty to recruit and retain students to keep us here.

Fighting for the best interests of our students, including future students, has been my driving force. As I said during the investiture ceremony when I officially took this job, students are number one on my priority list. After the North Dakota Board of Nursing’s efforts to block all possibilities for us to rebuild a Nursing faculty other than rehiring the faculty who decided to leave their positions and therefore their students, due to my refusal to bow to their demand that I give them special treatment not given to other DSU faculty members, I am now a roadblock to our current student’s success. So it is time for me to go.

Before I go, I would like to thank the many amazing people who worked shoulder-to-shoulder with me for DSU students. With regret that I will certainly miss some I should have included, due to the rush of time in writing this, I will list but a few, while acknowledging that there are many others.

First, a big thank you goes to the many financial and other supporters from southwestern North Dakota, eastern Montana, and many other states who provided scholarships and other help for our students. The $1.4 million in annual funded DSU scholarships makes a huge difference in the lives of our students.

Special thanks go to the officers and board members of the DSU Heritage Foundation and DSU HF Executive Director Ty Orton. Going from nothing a few years ago to over $20 million in endowments is beyond impressive.

Next, all of us who love DSU need to appreciate the efforts of many legislators from southwest North Dakota and elsewhere to support our students, especially those from our home district, former Senator Rich Wardner, Senator Dean Rummel, Rep. Vicky Steiner, and the remarkable Senate Majority Leader Mike Lefor. Thank you to all, but special thanks to Rep. Lefor. I do not believe we would be alive today without his many efforts for us, too many of which have gone without enough appreciation from us.

We are also grateful for the support DSU and our students have received from Dickinson Public Schools, other schools, the City of Dickinson, Stark County, the Fisher companies, TMI, Baker Boy, Steffes, Stark Development, the Theodore Roosevelt Medora Foundation, the Theodore Roosevelt Presidential Library, and the many other governmental, nonprofit, and business entities that roll up their sleeves and figure out ways to help DSU and otherwise make Dickinson and all of southwestern North Dakota such an amazing little corner of the globe. Nowhere else I have lived, and I have lived in a lot of places, is so dependent on, and blessed by, agencies and volunteers who recognize that they might be too small to have major impact when acting alone, but who can make a huge difference by working together.

I will forever be grateful to the members of the State Board of Higher Education and Chancellor Mark Hagerott for their many years supporting me. I believe all voting members of the State Board (other than the new members whom I do not yet know well) have reached out in support of DSU and me in the past few days, as has Chancellor Hagerott. Though I sometimes am hard to work with due to my continuous, often loud, and always long-winded advocacy for DSU, I am grateful that there has never been even the tiniest bit of lack of support for me as DSU president.

Thank you to the many DSU students who have assumed leadership roles, especially those on Student Senate, whom I worked with as one of their faculty advisors. Attending and participating in Student Senate meetings was a special joy and a great break from my other duties.

Although I have been criticized by those who think I care too much about our student-athletes, I cannot leave out the stunningly effective coaches, trainers, and others in DSU Athletics. They understand and pursue the hard, but crucial, work of recruiting students to DSU and providing them with the support that keeps them here, even when it means chewing them out so they keep going to class and completing assignments. Thank you for putting our students on the path to academic and athletic success.

Thank you, also, to many (though sadly not all) DSU faculty members, especially those who have been working hard to recruit students and keep them on paths to academic and career success. For those who have seen my battles with some on our faculty and might draw the wrong conclusion, please let me assure you that many on our faculty have been doing great work for our students for years, long before we adopted policies requiring those efforts, including credit hour production standards.

Because some have made it so hard to work in DSU administration, allow me to thank at least a few of those who have worked tirelessly for DSU’s students in administrative and director positions. Financial Aid Director Chris Meek, who quietly works his magic for our students, and his team are top notch. IT Director Todd Hauf and his team provide us with great service keeping the tech going, with no drama. Student Life Director Mackenzie Hicks and her team, including student members of the Campus Activities Board, have enlivened our campus for our students. Dean of Students Kayla Noah and her team, including our new Student Success Advisors, do so many things, many of them unnoticed, for our students. Provost Huijian Dong and former Provost/VP Debora Dragseth, took on leadership roles with skill and long hours of hard work, even though doing so made them the targets of attacks that no professional should have to endure.

Let me be clear: Criticism and disagreement are not just fine, but needed. But the viciousness of attack that one is required to endure as a DSU administrator is inhumane. Though I am leaving, may I make one request: Can we somehow please stop treating DSU administrators this way?

In particular, the attacks that DSU Vice President Holly Gruhlke has had to endure in her various administrative roles during my time as DSU President have been hurtful and just plain wrong. If you doubt this, you could review the Faculty Senate spring surveys from years past. I will not dignify them by quoting them here. And there are many other examples of attacks on this amazing servant of DSU.

Nobody has done more for DSU’s students before and during my time here than Dr. Holly Gruhlke. That includes me. It might even include Rep. Lefor, though he has done quite a bit in other ways. When Dr. Gruhlke has indicated a willingness to take on administrative positions, I have begged her to reconsider, because of the personal cost I feared she would pay. But she is a loyal DSU alum, so I could not stop her from applying. As with Rep. Lefor, I believe DSU would not be here today without Dr. Holly Gruhlke. She will forever have a spot on my personal Mount Rushmore of the very best I have had the good fortune to work with.

Allow me a personal, but important, note. Despite the prevalence of DSU alums in the Easton family, my wife Marivern went to college elsewhere. [Stanford. Impressive, to be sure, but not DSU, so it doesn’t really count.] But she has done so much for DSU, contributing her amazing intellect, wise insights, and hard work. She has also calmed down her overly emotional husband many times. Not this time, to be sure. But many other times. That is not easy work.

As discussed above, I am not currently allowed to fight for a key portion of DSU’s students in a program that I treasure and that I have been working to keep financially viable for a long time, Nursing. If that was not troublesome enough, I have also been advised that some who have supported DSU, financially and otherwise, might not do so if I continue as president. So it is time for me to leave.

That is sad for me, but we are all replaceable. As a blue and grey to the core loyal DSU alum, I leave fully supportive of DSU, including, indeed especially--after all of the dollars and administrative time and effort DSU has invested in trying our best to help the program thrive--DSU’s Nursing program. Long live DSU and long live DSU Nursing! I am confident that others will have the skill, that sadly I did not have, to get us through this.

Before I leave, please permit me to say, to the many members of the DSU family and the community of southwest North Dakota and eastern Montana who have supported DSU, and me, during my time as President, THANK YOU. Thank you for all you do for our students.

Please do not let this incident lessen your faith in, or your support of, our beloved college on the hill. Please continue to support DSU students through your financial gifts and other efforts, as Marivern and I will. Tough as this situation is for me, it would take a lot more than this for me to lose my love for this very special place.

Our hero Theodore Roosevelt famously spoke of “the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; [who] if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”

Though I tried with all my might to do the best I could for our beloved university, I made many mistakes, I committed many errors, and my shortcomings were numerous. For all of those mistakes, errors, and shortcomings, I apologize to all who love DSU. We are fortunate that there were so many others also working for our students to overcome my errors. [Well, most of them.]

But especially to our students: I am deeply sorry for my mistakes, errors, and shortcomings that hurt you, even as we dared greatly together. In particular, I am sorry for the pain you have had to endure while those of us who are supposed to be watching out for you, including me, are squabbling. Please do not let that cause you to lose your love for this very special place. DSU will get through this.

To our beloved students, it is true that, at least for a while as I fade into the background, I will no longer

. . . be in your classes when you make presentations that teach me things I did not know,

. . . hear you explain farming and ranching to excited little ones petting goats at Kids Day on the Farm,

. . . laugh with you about something silly at Student Senate meetings,

. . . watch you light up the room at history conferences,

. . . admire your work at art exhibitions,

. . . notice when you do nice things for each other and for others,

. . . marvel at your research at Celebration of Scholars,

. . . and cheer you on from the audience section of a play, a concert, or a Blue Hawk sporting event.

I will now miss all of that. So I will miss you. More than you know. DSU students are a very special breed.

Though I will not be there in person to cheer you on, please know that I will be supporting you from a distance, thinking, as I always do when you wonderful students do such remarkable things: Hawks are up!

Message video link: https://youtu.be/F7Bxk6dYmhc