BYU-Idaho president intent on rethinking education at the school

REXBURG, Idaho — If Kim Clark doesn't like southeastern Idaho, he doesn't show it. But one gets the feeling he'd be happy to have a few of the surrounding potato fields sprouting grass and water hazards.

An avid golfer, the new president of Brigham Young University-Idaho lights up when talking about the game in much the same way he smiles when asked about the future of a school he sees on the cusp of innovative educational endeavors the school's founder — Thomas Ricks — could scarce imagine.

He wants to "rethink education" here, not only with decades of Boston-based business-model application experience but with a firm grasp on the faith that gives life to an intangible feeling in Rexburg that students, faculty and staff dub "the spirit of Ricks."

During a recent interview, Clark told the Deseret Morning News, he has adopted a "laser focus on preparing young people through undergraduate education. Period."

And despite concern by some former colleagues to the contrary, he's happy to be here, he said, because "the concept of being a student-centered university is grounded in a very powerful logic. It allows you to ask, in every case, 'How does it benefit the students?' It helps keep the institution focused and moving in the appointed direction."

That direction, outlined by President Gordon B. Hinckley of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when he announced five years ago that the former Ricks College would become Brigham Young University-Idaho, has guided the school ever since. President Hinckley made it clear that excellent education would be the school's focus. It falls in line with some of what Clark was already doing at the Harvard Business School, exploring new ways to learn and to teach.

He wants to find "particular ways that define engagement of students in teaching one another and working with faculty," incorporating technology more broadly than it's ever been used before. "I believe we're at the Kitty Hawk phase of applying technology to education." While it's a start, Clark said relatively easy applications will give way over time to "collaborative tools that will allow students to learn and transact across time and space."

For instance, he sees a future classroom equipped with simulation technologies that would allow students to "actively participate and learn from an event taking place in cyberspace," much like a flight simulator allows pilots to train on the ground in an interactive environment that can be "very cost-effective."