Husson at 100

From its modest beginning as a single-focus business school in a Bangor storefront back in 1898, Husson College has quietly transformed itself into a powerful educational and economic engine for Northern Maine. Today, as Husson celebrates its centennial, it certainly is entitled to trumpet a bit.

Husson is enjoying record enrollments this year, with more than 2,100 students in graduate and undergraduate programs — second only to the University of Maine among the 13 colleges east of the Kennebec. A merger with the Eastern Maine Medical Center School of Nursing in 1982 marked the start of a movement beyond the world of accounting and business administration into health care, life sciences, paralegal studies and the humanities, a diversification that continues with the merger last year with the New England School of Communications.

It’s important that Husson has responded to a changing economy with graduate, undergraduate and associate degree programs that put the education where the jobs are. It’s just as important that Husson has remained true to its mission of providing that education to those most in need of it.

More than 1,900 of Husson’s students this past academic year were Mainers, a refreshing statistic given the “brain drain,” the increasing trend of the state’s high school graduates to continue their education out of state. More than 80 percent qualified for financial aid. With modest tuition, aid as generous as circumstances allow, admission requirements that balance the need for high standards with the understanding that not all freshmen are created equal, off-campus academic and community outreach programs throughout the state, Husson has distinguished itself as a college that gives all who aspire to higher education a fair shot at it, be they the children of low-income families or working adults seeking better lives.

And, as befits a school with its roots in business and the entrepreneurial spirit, Husson is in remarkably good fiscal shape. Squeezing the most out of its annual budget of $14 million, Husson has decreased its debt in the last decade from $8 million to less than $1.6 million, it pays for all capital improvements in cash, it receives no direct appropriation from the state. Although Husson’s recent capital campaigns have been highly successful, Mainers looking for the perfect 100th birthday gift need look no farther than the checkbook.

Over the past century, Husson College has established itself as an invaluable asset to Maine in general and to Northern Maine in particular. It has lived up fully to its motto: Character and (except for incessant reminders that Husson defeated a certain large state university in both basketball and lacrosse in the same recent year) Humility. Some things you just can’t be humble about.