Taking the "George Miller" concept to Oakland, California? | Howard University looks to open a satellite campus

THe San Francisco Chronicle reports, "An elite East Coast university is in ‘stealthy’ discussions to expand into Oakland," that DC's Howard University, a premiere HBCU (Historically Black College or University) is considering a facility in Oakland, California.

A few years ago, a Temple University professor, George Miller, wrote a provocative op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer about higher education's potential to spark revitalization in Philadelphia.  One proposal was to move a far suburbs based HBCU to the city. 

-- "HBCUs and the city: Relocating Cheyney University to Philadelphia?," 2021

The second was to create a multi-college innovation center at the Philadelphia Navy Yard.

 -- "The other George Miller idea: creating multi-college innovation centers in (cities) Philadelphia | Creating public library-college education centers as revitalization initiatives," 2021

For a declining city, Oakland has incredibly commercial and civic assets, even if it has lost its professional sports teams.

As Howard University looks to open a satellite campus in Oakland, California, the SF Bay's "second" city to SF, with a high percentage black population relative to the Bay area, and loss of population, businesses, and colleges ("Higher ed exposé focuses on Mills College," East Bay Express), as the economy has deindustrialized--the city was a major port and industry center--the George Miller ideas are relevant.

The thing though is to have impact, it needs to be more than a building for students to spend a semester at.  How can an HU presence be developed in a manner to have significant effect?

It's a building not a campus, "USC establishes new campus in the heart of Washington, D.C.," USC Today.  

I criticized Mayor Bowser's touting of a new USC building in DC as a major thing ("Straws and puffery: USC's DC "campus" as a lever for downtown revival").

There is a difference between a building holding a "semester in [fill in the blank] program" versus a true satellite campus and operation.  

For example, would an Oakland campus be a way for Howard's medical programs to link up with SF Bay biotech and Silicon Valley IT in a way to also feed into the DC campus?  

Under construction.

But in a manner that develops a local operation more comparable to how the University of Michigan has been developing an "innovation campus" in Detroit ("U-M Center for Innovation has long-awaited groundbreaking in Detroit," Detroit Free Press).

UM has a small building, but is building a 250,000sf facility to open in 2027 and is building a dormitory as well.  From the article:

The UMCI will be offering all-new classes and programs for U-M, McCauley said. ... it was once estimated that up to 1,000 students would be enrolled by the center's third year of operation, according to U-M Provost Laurie McCauley, that figure is no longer definite.

“We are not replicating programs that are going on in Ann Arbor," she said. "They are going to focus on interdisciplinarity and on aspects that are really new, cutting-edge programs.”

Another example is the University of Washington campus in Tacoma ("A place of promise: r three decades, UW Tacoma has sought to serve not only its students but the community as a whole," UW Magazine, "25 Things to Know as University of Washington Tacoma Turns 25," Tacoma News-Tribune). 

Originally, it too was just a building, but over the years has blossomed into a small campus, comprised of adaptive reuse of historic buildings ("UW Tacoma Carves out a Place in History," UW Magazine) along with new construction, and now an enrollment over 5,000 students--it started with 187--and a more metropolitan focus than the home campus, because the campus is part of Downtown Tacoma.  According to HistoryLink:

Urban renewal and economic development have been central aspects of UW Tacoma's impact on the local community. The move to the permanent campus in 1997 is widely credited with playing a key role in transforming what was previously a struggling neighborhood. Along with a new Washington State History Museum and a renovated Union Station (housing a U.S. District Court in a newly constructed addition), the emergence of UW Tacoma provided an architectural, community, and economic anchor at the southern end of downtown.

The surrounding neighborhood has since seen the opening of the Museum of Glass, a relocated Tacoma Art Museum, the Tacoma School of the Arts high school, the Link light rail system, and the Greater Tacoma Convention and Trade Center. Private resources complemented the public investments, with a hotel and several housing/mixed-use complexes opening by 2003. As one general estimate, approximately $1.5 billion in public and private money was invested in downtown Tacoma between 1990 and 2003.

To me, the proximity of Oakland to biotech and Silicon Valley makes this an opportunity of great potential for both Howard University and the City of Oakland.  Both benefit in different ways. But a campus, rather than a building is in keeping with HU's status as a premiere HBCU and a campus would stamp decidedly a west coast presence.

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Other blog entries on the leveraging of higher education for urban revitalization and growth.

-- "Better leveraging higher education institutions in cities and counties: Greensboro; Spokane; Mesa; Phoenix; Montgomery County, Maryland; Washington, DC," 2016
-- "Naturally occurring innovation districts | Technology districts and the tech sector," 2014
-- "Universities as elements of urban/downtown revitalization: the Portland State story and more," 2014
-- "President of Washington State University dies: fostered development of the "University District" adjacent to Downtown Spokane," 2015

-- "UW’s essential, and unappreciated, role in Seattle’s economic power," Seattle Times