Benjamin Sasse knows his way around the Midland Lutheran College campus.
His grandfather, Elmer Sasse, worked at the college for 33 years, most of those as vice president of finance.
Soon the 37-year-old will be spending a lot more time on the Fremont campus.
On Tuesday, the college’s Board of Trustees announced Sasse had been named president-elect. The board met in a special meeting on Monday to approve his hiring.
“This is home and the chance to come home has always been exciting,” Sasse said in an exclusive interview with the Tribune.
“For the past 15 years, probably twice a year, I’ve tried to lobby my wife that anybody with real character would want to raise their kids so they would have to walk beans and detassle corn,” he joked.
But he knows the challenges that face Midland as well as other Midwestern liberal arts colleges.
“There’s a unique challenge at a lot of liberal arts colleges in the Midwest,” he said. “There are 1,600 four-year colleges and universities in the country. About 200 of them have pretty significant enrollment challenges. I would put Midland in that bucket.”
Board members gave Sasse a transitional task: Conduct a critical review of the college and develop a strategic vision.
“The board gave me a transition task of conducting what will be a four- to five-month long top to bottom external review of everything we do at the college,” he said. “That’s going to be real ... soul-searching.
He sees the task having three possible outcomes.
“We’re going to find some programs we’re strong at but have done a horrible job of communicating how strong we are, and we’re going to get better at that,” he said.
“We’re going to need to add some programs. I need to figure out where we’ll get our maximum yield.
“We’re probably going to consolidate in some selected areas,” Sasse added. “It’s not plausible that a college the size of Midland offers as many programs as UNL but on paper we do. There will be some change involved in wanting to find out what our strengths are.”
Sasse said the college’s faculty, alumni, board and donors have a common belief that now is the time to review what the college does.
“We have a pretty strong alumni and donor base,” he said. “It’s a 126-year-old institution, and naturally you should have to go through a revisioning and a critical analysis every once in a while. I think we’re at a moment when there is a lot of common belief on the faculty, on the board and with our donors that this is the time to do that.”
He believes there are a group of donors who want to see the college move forward.
“A number of donors who have been sitting on their hands for the past couple of years are saying, frankly, that they’re ready to be engaged as long as Midland has a plan for a stable revenue model and a sufficient enrollment going forward,” Sasse said.
Sasse will work with interim president Stephen Fritz during the transition, which should be complete by April.
He praised the job Fritz has done.
“He’s been good for the college,” Sasse said.
Sasse spent part of Monday meeting with faculty.
“As a faculty, we are pleased that Dr. Sasse has accepted this position and believe that this is only the beginning of a dynamic chapter in the history of the college,” said Alcyone Scott, professor of English and the chairwoman of the faculty. “He brings to us a strong commitment to the role of the liberal arts college in American higher education, and an impressive set of academic achievements. We look forward to working with him to bring our college into a leadership position in educating young people to be able to adapt to and live lives of productive service in a constantly changing future.”
Board chairman Steven Bullock called the hiring “great news for our students, faculty and staff, donors and alumni.”
“This is a dynamic time in the world of education, and we’ve asked Dr. Sasse to look at innovative programs taking place at liberal arts colleges around the country to create strategies that will ensure Midland students receive a quality education.”
Sasse is a 1990 graduate of Fremont High School. He attended Harvard, Oxford and St. John’s before receiving his doctorate from Yale. He, his wife, Melissa, and daughters look forward to moving to Fremont.
He worked as a consultant to Fortune 500 companies and served numerous roles in the federal government, including U.S. Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services. He currently teaches public policy at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas.
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