With more than 40 years of experience as a higher education innovator and advocate, Dr. Peter P. Smith has dedicated his career to expanding access and opportunity for learners. He was instrumental in the development and launch of Open College at Kaplan University (OC@KU), a groundbreaking initiative that merges educational technology with personalized service to help learners achieve their academic and professional goals. By offering access to open courses, credit assessments, and faculty mentorship, OC@KU enables students to reduce both the cost and time required to earn a degree.
Dr. Smith’s career has spanned higher education, politics, and international affairs. He founded the Community College of Vermont in 1970, served as the founding president of California State University, Monterey Bay from 1995 to 2005, and held leadership roles beyond academia, including Lieutenant Governor of Vermont, member of the U.S. Congress, and Assistant Director General of UNESCO. Across these roles, his driving vision has remained constant: to create more flexible, inclusive systems of education that serve adults and others underserved by traditional higher education.
OC@KU embodies this vision by placing learners firmly in control of their education. Within months of launch, the platform engaged more than 1,200 learners; to date, over 3,000 unique visitors have accessed its open courses. Beyond course access, OC@KU offers a self-paced, open degree program—the Bachelor of Science in Professional Studies (BSPR). This innovative degree allows students to combine transfer credits, open course credits, and experiential learning into a customized program focused on professional knowledge, problem-solving, and strategic planning, culminating in a capstone portfolio project.
Through OC@KU, Dr. Smith has realized a powerful vision: not only providing free access to high-quality open courses for thousands of learners but also creating meaningful, affordable pathways to degree completion by recognizing and valuing college-level learning wherever it occurs.
