One of the things I like best about fall is college homecoming week; when we have a parade, a football game, receptions, awards programs and other campus events at Southwest Minnesota State University.

It demonstrates the value of SMSU to all of southwest Minnesota. I know that value almost as well as anyone, as someone who defied the logic of the late 20th century that everyone should have the experience of going off to college.

When I became seriously interested in attending SSU (the previous name) I heard from some well-meaning teachers and friends of parents who thought I should go somewhere else. They were concerned that I would just stay with my town friends, that it would be four more years of high school.

I chose SMSU for more reasons than location. In my visits to the campus, I was very impressed with the facilities and the faculty.

I felt right at home in the student center, with its dome lounge and snack bar. I liked the English department, and the fact that we had minors in several foreign languages.

I consider SMSU the best decision I’ve ever made in my life. I grew through my experiences on campus. We still had many of our charter faculty members in the late 1980s. They were awesome teachers, true believers when it came to having a desire to learn.

There was an excellent amount of personal attention. One of my advisors informed me in my sophomore year that I was easily within striking range of a double major. I chose to follow through with that and majored in history as well as English. I also earned a Spanish minor.

I felt I could still experience the social side of college even if I stayed in Marshall and I’m pleased to say I was right about that.

I quickly made new friends on campus while keeping friends from high school. It was fun to have opportunities to bring town friends out to campus and to show campus friends the community and surrounding area.

After my 1990 graduation I worked for 14 years at the Independent before deciding to go to graduate school. At that point SMSU came through for me again with its Master of Business Administration program. I was able to specialize in marketing, which led to the next steps in my career.

SMSU is a huge part of what led me to stay in Marshall. Without it, I probably would have ended up in a college town somewhere in the region,

I might have come back after four years. Then again, I might have stayed in the college town or gone to a new community.

I might have become part of the “brain drain” of the late 20th century, when so many high ranking students left their small towns after high school. There was a widespread felling that if you wanted to succeed you had to go the Twin Cities. Many people thought you at least had to go somewhere.

SMSU provides southwestern Minnesota with a choice. The graduates have a good chance of getting a well-paying jobs within the region.

It’s nice in 2023 to have a sizable number of alumni, to have some who can look back and remember the earliest history. They remember the “college in a cornfield” from when the campus first got its start in the late 1960s.

Homecoming Week now brings back those memories and plenty more from years in between. A lot has changed at SMSU in the past 55 years.

We have a two-story Student Center, a renovated library, the RA Facility, an events center stadium, a new greenhouse, and a variety of computer labs.

What hasn’t changed is the advantage of a small public college. One of the things I’ve always liked best about SMSU is that it doesn’t try to turn students into something they aren’t. All students have a chance to be themselves, to make their own choices.

I’m watching with interest as SMSU continues to grow in the 21st century. I wonder what its future will hold. One thing I know after all these years is that it definitely has a future.

We weren’t certain about that in the late 1970s, a time of enrollment decline and budget cuts. Things turned around in the 1980s and have gone well since, to the point of repeatedly earning a number one rating for best small public liberal arts college.

It was rewarding for me as an undergrad to see the university expand. It was rewarding in graduate school to watch it bounce back from the destructive fire in Food Service East. Homecoming Week is a great time to look back on those days and to celebrate what we currently have.

— Jim Muchlinski is a longtime reporter and contributor to the Marshall