Betsy Fleming, President of Converse College

UpstateBizSC:
Where were you born and raised?

Betsy Fleming:
Both my parents were from the Spartanburg area, but I was actually born in Indianapolis where my father was pursuing advanced medical training.  My father was a cardiologist who moved back to Spartanburg when I was five to set up his own private practice. I grew up in Spartanburg, and spent my last two years of high school at Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire.

I loved the arts and spent most of my youth as a dancer.  I credit a lot of my early exposure to the arts to Converse’s pre-college music and dance programs and the Spartanburg Day School, in particular, a wonderful art teacher named Dangerfield Ashton.

UpstateBizSC:
What is your educational background?

Betsy Fleming:
I went to Harvard University with an original intention of pursuing a law degree.  I had worked for Strom Thurmond before college and did a stint in Joe Kennedy’s office during the summer after my freshman year.  As a freshman, however, I fell in love with art history and started to contemplate the career options for an art historian.  I worked my last couple of years for the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard.

I earned a Masters in the History of Design at the Royal College of Art in London and simultaneously worked in the furniture department at the Victoria & Albert Museum.  From there, I went to the Getty Grant Program in Los Angeles where I cut my teeth in administration.  After that, I moved to New York and worked for The Frick Collection, spearheading their first ever market survey and Young Fellows program.

Looking around me, the directors I most admired had their doctorates, so I decided to go to Yale to pursue a Ph.D. in art history.  While completing dissertation research, I returned to New York City to teach a course on branding and design at Parsons and to work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  From New York, I was tapped to become the executive director of the Gibbes Museum of Art in Charleston.

UpstateBizSC:
Describe the challenges of moving from leading a museum to a college.

Betsy Fleming:
Initially people were a bit skeptical, perhaps because of my relatively young age and lack of experience within academic institutions, but being a local girl whose mother was a Converse graduate helped.

I loved the Gibbes, and had no intention of leaving at that time.  The Board of Converse wanted a president who could shift the strategic focus of the College, ask different kinds of questions about the institution, its role and its purpose.  They were looking for a change agent.  I was intrigued and thought it would be an interesting challenge.

Several factors eased my transition into the academic setting.  Dealing with a large board can be a pitfall for someone entering into a CEO or President’s role, but I had worked with a large board at the Gibbes.   Also, curators and faculty are alike in many ways: talented, extremely bright, with strong opinions and fields of specialization.

UpstateBizSC:
Give a brief history of Converse College.

Betsy Fleming:
We are a women’s college that was founded over one hundred twenty years ago by a group of local citizens of Spartanburg.  The college is named for one of these men, Dexter Edgar Converse, who was especially instrumental in establishing the vision and mission of the institution.

The well being of a country depends much upon the culture of its women is a significant part of the original vision that was set out for us by our founder.  It was progressive at the time, and we think that it still has value and meaning today.  There were only 14 women’s colleges in the US founded before us.  Converse has produced strong characters:  the only South Carolinian to win a Pulitzer Prize, Julia Mood Peterkin, a three star major general in the US Army, a justice on the Supreme Court of Texas.

UpstateBizSC:
Describe the first few years on the job and the process of change that you initiated.

Betsy Fleming:
When I arrived in 2005, I inherited a strategic plan with two years left, so in my first year, I spent most of the time listening.  We then undertook an environmental scan of the market demands of college graduates and a review of the College’s programs to determine how we could play to our strengths while still producing strong graduates of Converse in the 21st century.  In November 2007, we launched our new strategic vision and plan.

What skill sets do workplaces, professions and communities need in college graduates today?  That was the main question that we asked.  The answer – creativity, flexibility, adaptability, problem solving, and a strong sense of community – has become the focus of our new strategic vision.  Being a small liberal arts college with a strong tradition in the arts, we felt that we already had a solid foundation in developing those qualities and needed to develop them further.   With a top notch school of music, a growing presence in design, theatre and dance, and strong undergraduate research, we uncovered our real mark of distinction: creativity.

UpstateBizSC:
What is the value of single gender education?  Did it come up at all during the strategic planning to move to a co-educational college?

Betsy Fleming:
There are wonderful statistics that support the advantages of single gender education, particularly for women, but we asked the question about whether this was how we wanted to distinguish ourselves in the larger market for higher education in the 21st century.  Some women’s colleges have become co-ed, Vassar in New York, for one.  We knew that the market still valued single gender education, but everything was up for discussion during our planning sessions.

On the national level, only 16% of Congressional representatives and Senators are female, so inequities still exist.  Given the status of women in South Carolina (where we draw the majority of our students), it is especially important to provide a nurturing, empowering environment for women.  This is an institution that is designed to work with women to help them exercise their independent voices, to become their best selves.  Choice is absolutely imperative to ensuring the educational advancement of the next generations of Americans.  It is especially important to offer single gender as a choice for college bound women.

UpstateBizSC:
Who are your competitors?

Betsy Fleming:
Our competitor really is any post secondary institution that a graduating female high school senior might consider for their college education.  Our biggest competitors are public universities in South Carolina, North Carolina and Georgia.

UpstateBizSC:
Other than being women only, what differentiates Converse College from other colleges?

Betsy Fleming:
Strong evidence indicates that women learn best when they are given hands-on learning opportunities.  Experiential learning in small classes (a 10:1 student faculty ratio) and an opportunity to work immediately shoulder to shoulder with tenured faculty in seminars – that is what differentiates Converse.

Our student/faculty research is also a key differentiator.  We lead the state in terms of independent colleges for grants awarded and projects funded by the South Carolina Independent Colleges and Universities.  We invest heavily in research and it is an integral part of our creativity initiative.  We are not a Research  1 Institution, but we can play a critical role in helping channel some strong undergraduate students into Research 1 Institutions.

We don’t aim to graduate students who know everything, but we can ensure that our graduates are open to other perspectives, are problem-solvers who can work in a team, and are able to find information from a variety of sources.

UpstateBizSC:
Does this research take place at the graduate level or undergraduate level?

Betsy Fleming:
What I am talking about is our strong undergrad research.  How do you know you want to get a PHD unless you are given an opportunity to develop a theory or hypothesis as an undergrad?  We offer our students an extensive process of exploration and discovery where they can work directly with a faculty member to determine whether a particular hypothesis is true or not.  Our seniors in the arts have capstone projects that they have to plan from start to finish – a concert, or an exhibition, for example. Last year, 50% of our graduating class either participated in a research project or an independent creative project.  In all subject areas, we have the resources to foster the development of a curious mind at the undergraduate level.  It is smaller scale research, but sometimes the students’ papers get published, and the expectation is that they will present their research at conferences.

Other universities may have senior research projects, but nowhere is research such an integral part of every student’s experience as it is at Converse.  Ours is more broad-based and interdisciplinary across the schools.  This priority on research, independent projects, collaboration is hugely beneficial to women.

UpstateBizSC:
Is Converse particularly well known for any of its departments?

Betsy Fleming:
We are a liberal arts college that has solid departments in all areas.  That said, we have a long history of training educators and in the arts—especially music, art and design.  Our science departments and English and creative writing are also strong.  I am especially proud of the newly launched and unique MFA program in Creative and Professional Writing.

UpstateBizSC:
How do you measure success?

Betsy Fleming:
Our strategic plan is an active document that is designed to constantly give us feedback about whether we are achieving our goals.  We have developed a one-page report card, a progress report that indicates with simple arrows whether we are on track in a multitude of areas.  Getting picked up by external entities like Washington Monthly is affirming.  Recently we were ranked as the number one value in the south by US News and World Report. We do keep track of our public standing (rankings etc.), but simple metrics such as enrollment numbers and funding for our building projects are easily available and critical to our success.  The level of funding that we have been able to attain in this economy is a huge achievement.

The greatest personal satisfaction that I get is seeing the degree to which our entire campus has come to understand and appreciate the role that creativity, adaptability, and problem-solving play in our new strategic vision for the College, and how these concepts have been integrated into the teaching and learning.  That has totally changed how we operate as an institution.

Last spring was a real tipping point for us in this new strategic plan.  We really started hitting our internal targets and this has enabled us to move our focus to broader external goals.

UpstateBizSC:
How were you affected by the down economy?

Betsy Fleming:
We took a major hit on our endowment – a 30% decline – that forced us to move very quickly to cut $1.8M out of our $23M operating budget.  We did a lot of consolidation, and with that, comes the painful decisions about staffing.  We revamped our academic and operational structures, integrating teams from different areas into what we now call centers.  We phased out majors that were not of great viability for 21st century studies:  Organ Performance and Piano Pedagogy, as examples. We changed the way that we teach languages, integrating them more with other majors, and ramped up an Individualized Major program.

It was a really difficult time for us, but we feel as though we have come out of the process a leaner and more efficient school that can better serve the needs of its students.  We have been very proactive through this process to communicate with families and to make every attempt to hold tuition and fees as steady as possible.  Over 90% of our students receive some form of either government or institutional financial aid.  We revamped our scholarship program so that our students and families get a clearer picture of what scholarships are possible for them.

UpstateBizSC:
What is your view on technology?

Betsy Fleming:
We have a historic campus that makes investments in technology especially challenging, but we have made significant investments in order to ensure that our technology is as up to speed as it can be.  We have also made significant upgrades to our sound and lighting systems in all of the auditoriums and theater spaces.

The important question is how to integrate technology into your curriculum to support your goals. We want to ensure our graduates are effective global communicators – writing and research, public speaking, social media platforms, Facebook, Twitter, email – and all of our investments in technology support that goal.  We also believe strongly that all the best technology in the world will never replace the value of face to face interaction and debate.

UpstateBizSC:
Do you have other channels for revenue at the college?

Betsy Fleming:
Housing is an important part of revenue.  We are phasing in enhancements to our campus housing to support our growing enrollment and to strengthen that revenue stream.  We are also heading into a process of analyzing the revenue generation of core strengths, and considering the possibility of expanding particular academic programs.

UpstateBizSC:
What is your enrollment?

Betsy Fleming:
Enrollment is increasing.  We have about 1,500 students, 750 undergrads and about the same number of graduate students.  We have a goal of increasing our enrollment no less than 10% a year while maintaining our 10:1 student/faculty ratio.

UpstateBizSC:
Does a college like Converse have an athletic program?

Betsy Fleming:
The biggest growth area for us in terms of undergraduate recruiting is our athletic program.  We are one of just two women’s colleges that have NCAA Division 2 sports teams.  In 2007, we became a member of Conference Carolinas and we compete in volleyball, cross country, soccer, swimming (new), basketball, tennis, lacrosse (new), equestrian (brand new).  The advantage of having a Division 2 program is that our students have the potential to receive both athletic and academic scholarship money.  Our program offers a nice balance between social, sports and academics.

UpstateBizSC:
What books would you recommend?

Betsy Fleming:
Dan Pink’s book, A Whole New Mind, was a major part of the framework for our strategic plan and required reading for the entire Converse community during the process.  I would recommend it to anybody, but particularly educators.

I like reading biographies.  Anything to do with Teddy Roosevelt, Elizabeth the First or the founding fathers are personal favorites.  With the founding fathers, I love the notion of people coming together to create something that had never been accomplished and how they negotiated their fairly substantial differences.  My bedside table will have eight books on it – spiritual, biography, fiction, business books, newspapers, magazines.  I like variety.

UpstateBizSC:
What is your leadership style?

Betsy Fleming:
I am curious.  I love to explore.  I ask a ton of questions, and once we set a course, I am determined.  I have made good use of mentors all along the way, people who understood my skill sets better than I did myself.  Other than my mother, there is no one person who has influenced me.

One of the great pleasures of being a university president is that you are surrounded by young students filled with amazing dreams, hopes and aspirations.  I take great inspiration from the students and make sure that I am always creating informal opportunities to sit down and talk with them.  We have assembled an excellent senior management team.  The leadership challenge is giving those around the license to throw out a different idea.  I believe in the power of having reflective or creative moments.   I try to shift a meeting from simple reporting to idea generation.  You have to engage your team to make recommendations.

Perhaps this is because I was trained as a historian, but I feel it is really important to develop a knack for affecting change and also making sure that the past is relevant to today, to the 21st century more broadly.