You're in Vandal Country. Sorry all you Broncos and Eagles and Grizzlies and Cougars, but you are. And that's not going to change anytime soon. In fact, if Chuck Staben has his way, Vandal Country's boundaries are going to grow.

Staben, the University of Idaho's president, is an academician and administrator who claims he can't communicate very well. For a guy who earned his Ph.D. in biochemistry from Cal-Berkeley and could tell you everything you never wanted to know about fungal developmental biology and fungal genomics, we think he communicates just fine. We do prefer to talk about things like getting our kids into and through college without mortgaging the farm, however, and that's OK with Chuck. In fact, it's better than OK. He speaks higher ed fluently and fervently.

As head of the state's land grant university, Staben actually has a lot to talk about. Brookings Institution's 2015 ranking says UI is the best school in the state based on student success after graduation. The school also has been ranked in the top 50 for "best bang for your buck" among national universities. And according to CollegeNet, University of Idaho ranked 21st on its social mobility index. The index measures the impact an institution has on helping lower-income students enter careers that promise livable earnings. In other words, UI consistently improves the quality of life trajectory not just for students, but perhaps for generations of Idaho families.

While Staben is hesitant to sound at all critical of Idaho's other fine four-year institutions - he won't go there - we will point out that for families earning less than $48,000 per year, the University of Idaho offers the most affordable net price for an education in the state. In bridging the state's glaring gap between high school graduates and those who go on to earn four-year degrees, Idaho clearly answers the call with a quality education that most Idahoans can afford without insufferable loans.

A better educated populace leads to a stronger home-bred workforce, which boosts business and triggers a rising tide in every positive economic and cultural category. We suspect that Staben's overall mission is to get more Idaho kids into college - any college - although he's working hardest for one in particular.

Idaho is, after all, his country.