All about Hillsdale College's plan to build a campus near Roseville

Hillsdale College was founded in 1844 and describes itself as a "nonsectarian Christian" college.

The central campus is in Michigan and in 2010 Hillsdale opened a satellite campus in Washington D.C. In 2021 they opened the Blake Center for Faith and Freedom in Somers, Connecticut, according to Norton.

There is a total of 1,600 students in the student body including graduate students and there are 73 students from California that attend the school. Norton said they have students from all 50 states and 14 countries.

Students graduating from Hillsdale receive either a bachelor of arts or a bachelor of science.

"Many people would like to know that our core curriculum at the school — people all have to take physics. They all have to take science classes. They all have to take the harder math classes so it stretches people. There's very few people that can come in, and they're solid on all those subjects," Norton said.

Weygandt said this classic style of education that teaches Artistotle and Plato would fit into Placer County.

"I do think there's certainly an appetite for what I would call maybe a more traditional educational platform that's focused more on fundamentals and basics," Weygandt said. "We see that in Placer County in a huge way with charter schools. And there's a significant growth in religious-based schools, Christian schools in the county, so I'm presuming that demand would extend into university curriculum, and certainly the demand for Hillsdale types of services."

Why Placer County?

Norton said having a location in California will allow the college to be coast to coast.

"It's actually one of the largest donor pools we have — may have the largest readership now of our newsletter, of course, California is a big state it's an important state, and Dr. Arnn, our president, came from Claremont Institute there in California. So we love California," Norton said.

Norton said the choice in Placer County comes down to unlimited potential in the location.

"We think it's ideally located to both the state Capitol, to recreation and I personally think it's great that it's not too far from Lake Tahoe, San Francisco and other places. But the campus will be a serious place for people to engage in serious learning as it is in Hillsdale Michigan and we will do our best if we come there to that area to be the best neighbor that we can be," Norton said.

Unlike other public or private universities, Hillsdale doesn't receive any state or federal money, which means students can't use some federal loans or scholarships to pay for their education at Hillsdale. Norton said the school has a fund that replaces money that would be coming from federal loans and the Pell Grant system and last year they raised $5.8 million from donors. 

Sacramento developer, Angelo Tsakopoulos, worked with Placer County in the early 2000s and led the group that originally donated the 1,100 acres of land to UDF in 2012.

“Understanding what it means to be a good human being and a good society is key to individual happiness as well as the survival of our Just nation, and indeed, of humankind itself”, said Angelo Tsakopoulos in a statement. “That is what a liberal arts education is all about. There is arguably no greater gift we can give to future generations than the opportunity to have a liberal arts education that includes an understanding of our founding principles and our United States Constitution.”

Norton said the fundamentals of the campus include treating everyone on an equal footing.

"We believe that beginning and end of all knowledge is understanding of God in the Bible, but then we have all of these other great thoughts and the students are taught personal dignity, personal respect, a lot of character and so it's a fine campus to come to," Norton said.

With the new California campus, Norton said the people he has talked to have been excited about the possibility of a new school coming to Placer County.

"Part of our sales pitch, if you will, is that they're going to work hard in snowy Michigan in a small town and it's going to be rather grueling, so I don't know if we come to California we may have to modify that a little bit," Norton said.

Norton said when people visit the Michigan campus one of the things they comment about at Hillsdale college is how students save their seats in the lunchroom.

"The way these students often mark their seat is they go into the cafeteria and they put down their iPhone or their car keys and then go out of sight. [They] go through the line and then know that nobody is going to bother their car keys or their iPad," Norton said.

Controversy

The New York Times published an article in February 2017 titled "In Hillsdale College, a ‘Shining City on a Hill’ for Conservatives" where it outlines that the college doesn't follow Title IX guidelines and does not report on student race or ethnicity.

Politico published an article in July 2021 titled "Trump ally Hillsdale College pitches 1619 Project counterweight" outlining Hillsdale's 1776 curriculum that is reportedly less critical of the U.S. especially in terms of the impact racism and inequality played in the foundation of the country.

Hillsdale's website reads in part "The College values the merit of each unique individual, rather than succumbing to the dehumanizing, discriminatory trend of so-called “social justice” and “multicultural diversity,” which judges individuals not as individuals, but as members of a group and which pits one group against other competing groups in divisive power struggles."

Placer County Democratic Central Committee said in a statement to ABC10 that they feel the Placer County Board of Supervisors missed an opportunity. They said that affordable housing is needed for students attending the existing and other planned college campuses.  

"Placer County is currently served by William Jessup University (a private Christian college) and Sierra College (a public university system campus) for post-secondary education. With the approval of the Sunset Area plan, the BOS has also given the green light for a satellite campus of Sacramento State University in Placer County. We feel that our region will receive no additional benefit from Hillsdale College coming to Placer County," Placer County Democrats said in a statement.

The PCDCC  statement didn't address the college's conservative values. 

ABC10 reached out to Placer County Republican Party and South Placer Republican Women Federated but did not receive a response.

Norton, the Hillsdale College V.P., told ABC10 that Hillsdale has been having discussions about potentially renovating the Tower Theatre in downtown Roseville.

"It would be far more than just the college needs to use if it would be a service and benefit to the community in some way if there's other nonprofits that might be interested in helping us with that," Norton said.

Norton said they're currently looking at the cost of renovating the site and looking at whether it should stay at the current capacity or increase it.

"Angelo Tsakopoulos has been kind enough to tip that potentially the way of the college if it's going to serve both an education and arts purpose, he'd love to see that," Norton said.

The UDF is now in a 30-day escrow period to purchase the Tower Theatre located in downtown Roseville.

Angelo Tsakopoulos donated the theater to the city in 1989 and as part of that deal, put restrictions on the deed. Those restrictions mean the theater can only be used to benefit the arts and couldn't be sold without Tsakopoulos' clearance, based on the document proposal to sell the venue to the UDF.

The city, Tsakopoulos and the UDF are involved in a long-term effort to create a private university with a campus near Roseville or in the surrounding area, according to the proposal. Hillsdale College is that fit.

According to the proposal, bringing a university to the area would utilize Roseville's Tower Theatre on a long-term basis and bring more traffic downtown, which could lead to increased support of downtown businesses and result in additional sales tax revenue.

Roseville's Economic Development Manager Wayne Wiley previously told ABC10 that the Tower Theatre is part of the city's overarching goal to revitalize downtown Roseville.

"The city's goal is to activate the Tower Theatre on a more permanent basis to really help add to the vibrancy of our downtown," Wiley said. "And so, if we can have folks in there utilizing the facility, holding different events — it's a stimulus to our downtown and to our downtown businesses."

Sacramento State

Outside of Hillsdale, Placer County is also working with California State University Sacramento to develop a satellite of Sacramento State.

Placer Ranch was donated by Eli Broad, an entrepreneur and philanthropist, to Sacramento State to develop Sacramento State Placer Center.

It's 300 acres of land in the Sunset Area of Placer County, according to Weygandt. About 1,500 students could use the Placer Center and could be simultaneously enrolled at Sacramento State and Sierra College in Rocklin, which is a feeder school.

“Sacramento State is turning away 3,000 to 4,000 students every year. Placer Center will enable us to educate students closer to home, allowing them to further develop their network in Placer and enrich the region upon graduation. It will also allow us to free up space on the main campus for students who are waiting in line for their chance to come to Sac State," University President Robert S. Nelsen said in a statement.

The Sunset Area Plan is also intended to create high-wage jobs for residents in the area and according to Placer County.

"I think it'll just really uplift the growth that we're planning as we as we go forward and it's important to know that over the next 50 years, our population is likely to grow unless economic conditions change and that you know the growth is probably gonna double over that timeframe," Weygandt said.

William Jessup University

William Jessup University is a private, Christian institution with a campus in Rocklin that lies in Weygandt's district.

Weygandt said William Jessup has been successful in Placer County.

"I think there still is demand for a wide mix. I think one of the rich things about Placer County with the addition of Hillsdale is it with William Jessup and California State University and Sierra College will have just a very provocative mix of options here that are unique," Weygandt said.

Weygandt said the addition of Hillsdale will distinguish Placer County even more as a special place in California.

RELATED: 

• Placer County Board of Supervisors delay vote on camping ordinance
• Placer County Board of Supervisors moves forward with Roseville hotel purchase
• Roseville residents could see a third waste bin for the first time with new composting plan
• Placer County supervisors say there are no specific plans for homeless shelter in Roseville or Rocklin