GLENVILLE, W.Va. — Long-time educator and Glenville State President Dr. Peter Barr will retire at the end of the 2016-17 academic school year, the school announced Wednesday.
Though Dr. Barr, a native of Huntington, said he’s going to enjoy his 12th and final year in Glenville, he said it was a great treat to learn about a part of the state that he wasn’t all that familiar with when he moved there in 2006.
“Interestingly, even though I was born and raised in Huntington, I really didn’t know Central West Virginia,” he said. “It was a great move. We moved here. People were wonderful; typical West Virginians. Hard working. Great spirit.”
Dr. Barr said one of his proudest moments in Glenville was working with local school districts on the Hidden Promise Consortium in an attempt to identify students who may have been falling through the cracks based on traditional academic standards.
“We’re all interested in the same thing,” he said. “It’s kind of like mom and apple pie. You want more kids to graduate from high school. You want higher ACT scores. You want more kids graduating from college.”
Too many students, he said, are college-worthy in West Virginia but never attempt to move on to higher education.
“They are certainly smart enough–capable enough,” he said. “Maybe they are first generation. Maybe they are low to moderate income so they don’t have the background to encourage them to go to college.”
Fewer than 20 percent of West Virginia students go on to get their college degree. In central West Virginia, he said that number is closer to ten percent.
“You are trying to entice them into a college education,” he said. “And you know the importance of that college education. The idea that you would cut funding to higher education is–somehow–I really don’t understand that.”
Dr. Barr said students in West Virginia who come from small towns and rural areas would likely better connect with the small, family atmosphere at Glenville State. The school has an enrollment of around 1800.
“We’re not for everybody,” he said. “But we provide–what I would perceive to be–a private education at a public cost.”
Dr. Barr has also worked at Marshall University and Coastal Carolina.