Colleges in Dire Financial Straits

[Wahoo Redux]

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Iowa State is imposing huge cuts on all its departments - up to 25% in some cases: https://www.inside.iastate.edu/article/2022/02/24/lasbudget

For the effects on the History Department, see this thread: https://twitter.com/HistoryBrian/status/1502303314960072708

"effort to reimagine programs"

What a stupid euphemism. 

[mamselle]

The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Iowa State is imposing huge cuts on all its departments - up to 25% in some cases: https://www.inside.iastate.edu/article/2022/02/24/lasbudget

For the effects on the History Department, see this thread: https://twitter.com/HistoryBrian/status/1502303314960072708

"effort to reimagine de-imagine programs"

What a stupid euphemism.

There. Fixed that for you.

M.

[Hibush]

"demand for courses that satisfy general education requirements has decreased over the last decade, as most students now arrive on campus having already earned a significant number of college credits in high school."

This trend, and the policies that drive it, in Iowa was apparent years ago. What curricular adjustments have they been making? Underenrolled classes are a pretty obvious manifestation of the shifting demand.

[mythbuster]

In the twitter feed, shade was thrown at the departments that "really" caused the deficit. I'd be curious to know who they are. Since it's arts and sciences, I doubt that all departments are losing enrollment. Would they happen to be the science majors that are well enrolled but have expensive labs? Or departments that have grown successfully and are now pushing for new TT lines to meet demand?

[Hibush]

In the twitter feed, shade was thrown at the departments that "really" caused the deficit. I'd be curious to know who they are. Since it's arts and sciences, I doubt that all departments are losing enrollment. Would they happen to be the science majors that are well enrolled but have expensive labs? Or departments that have grown successfully and are now pushing for new TT lines to meet demand?

It was the gened requirements that students are doing in high school AP or community college. English and chemistry. History and calculus.

[Hibush]

I'd say this qualifies as dire: https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/12/08/ohio-valley-university-will-close

From the article:

The university is working on a plan to help students finish their educations elsewhere. Enrollment has dipped below 200.

Apparently the registrars office is understaffed, and unable to send transcripts. What would be the appropriate staffing level for a "University" that size?

I can't even wrap my head around how this place operated. How many faculty in most places don't teach more than 200 students a year? Even if they only had one degree program for everyone, this would still have a ridiculous faculty/student ratio.

CHE has a post mortem.

The blame goes squarely on a board that was completely resistant to dealing with reality. "Up until the very end, OVU's top brass never lost faith that their institution could be saved."

There were so many mistakes it is incredible. They thought they could save the place by selling their coal to the devil, but even that backfired when they tried to do it twice.

"Absent from Ohio Valley's 97-page bankruptcy petition are the names of its former employees and the back wages owed them." The leadership really went out of its way to hurt those who were most loyal to the institution.

[apl68]

So, in the 1990s a two-year college with a couple hundred students decided to go on a building spree in an effort to transform itself into a four-year school, and rebranded itself as a "university."  They spent the next decade building and borrowing millions of dollars.  In 2007 this school with fewer than 700 students borrowed $17 million with what sounds like a crackpot industrial startup for collateral.  They spent two decades robbing Peter to pay Paul, until they finally ran out of Peters.

You have to wonder what possessed the trustees of this tiny school to imagine that it made sense for them to undertake such a massive, debt-fueled expansion in the 1990s.  A lot of schools were doing that during the 1990s, of course, but this was an extreme case.  It's a sad business for everybody--students, staff, and donors who could have put their resources to much better use.

I'm reminded of the Gospel account of the temptation of Jesus.  At one point the Devil urged Jesus to demonstrate his faith by jumping from the pinnacle of the Temple.  He justified it by quoting Scripture to the effect that God would send angels to protect his chosen ones.  Jesus replied that Scripture also says "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test."  There's such a thing as stepping out in faith, but then there's also such a thing as putting God to the test by jumping off the Temple and expecting angels to catch you.  Sounds like OVU's trustees were guilty of the latter.

[mamselle]

OVU was definitely a Johnny-come-lately to the Ohio academic scene.

I grew up in Columbus and went to OSU, and I've never heard of it from friends before or since (and at least one person in our HS class went to Antioch, which then was the lowest-level school you could apply to; you were practically guaranteed admission).

I'm also still in touch with colleagues there and give conference papers once or twice a year in the medieval field and have never, ever heard an academic research paper from there, or seen work by anyone there in any serious format, arts, humanities, or otherwise.

So, they didn't cast a very long or deep shadow, ever, it seems to me.

Still, RIP

M.

[apl68]

OVU was definitely a Johnny-come-lately to the Ohio academic scene.

I grew up in Columbus and went to OSU, and I've never heard of it from friends before or since (and at least one person in our HS class went to Antioch, which then was the lowest-level school you could apply to; you were practically guaranteed admission).

I'm also still in touch with colleagues there and give conference papers once or twice a year in the medieval field and have never, ever heard an academic research paper from there, or seen work by anyone there in any serious format, arts, humanities, or otherwise.

So, they didn't cast a very long or deep shadow, ever, it seems to me.

Still, RIP

M.

My parents met in the early 1960s at a tiny, denominationally-affiliated two-year college in Arkansas.  It was, and is, about the size of Ohio Valley University.  Or rather, about the size OVU was at its peak.  But they never seem to have had delusions about trying to be anything other than a two-year institution.  OVU could perhaps be usefully serving students today if they hadn't tried to go big.

[sonoamused]

So, in the 1990s a two-year college with a couple hundred students decided to go on a building spree in an effort to transform itself into a four-year school, and rebranded itself as a "university."  They spent the next decade building and borrowing millions of dollars.  In 2007 this school with fewer than 700 students borrowed $17 million with what sounds like a crackpot industrial startup for collateral.  They spent two decades robbing Peter to pay Paul, until they finally ran out of Peters.

You have to wonder what possessed the trustees of this tiny school to imagine that it made sense for them to undertake such a massive, debt-fueled expansion in the 1990s.  A lot of schools were doing that during the 1990s, of course, but this was an extreme case.  It's a sad business for everybody--students, staff, and donors who could have put their resources to much better use.

I'm reminded of the Gospel account of the temptation of Jesus.  At one point the Devil urged Jesus to demonstrate his faith by jumping from the pinnacle of the Temple.  He justified it by quoting Scripture to the effect that God would send angels to protect his chosen ones.  Jesus replied that Scripture also says "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test."  There's such a thing as stepping out in faith, but then there's also such a thing as putting God to the test by jumping off the Temple and expecting angels to catch you.  Sounds like OVU's trustees were guilty of the latter.

it sounds like in some cases what possessed the trustees was greed.   They were giving the school high interest rate person loans!

[mamselle]

I strongly suspected something like that in the recent demise of a local seminary. The trustees gaslighted the students and faculty, putting them into committees to offer plans by which to "save the school."

Meanwhile, they had to have been in conversations that resulted in the near-immediate sale of the buildings and properties to a 'younger' school that was already renting some of the facilities. The sale of the remnant went though so quickly, it must have been in the final planning stages when they set the academic folks to their ill-fated pseudo-tasks.

The interim president resigned over their bad-faith actions and they had to bring a very retired dean back to oversee the campus while they closed it down.

M.

[AmLitHist]

Lincoln College, in Lincoln, IL, to close in May.

[Hibush]

Lincoln College, in Lincoln, IL, to close in May.

While Covid hurt a lot, it appears the coup de grace was a cyberattack. Like many small or financially strapped schools, this one must have had limited resources to prevent or fix the attack because they system was down for a month and a half. No access to anything needed to operate the school or to communicate electronically!

How many other schools are vulnerable to such a disruption?

[mamselle]

That's just plain sick.

I hate hackers.

M.

[biop_grad]

Lincoln College, in Lincoln, IL, to close in May.

While Covid hurt a lot, it appears the coup de grace was a cyberattack. Like many small or financially strapped schools, this one must have had limited resources to prevent or fix the attack because they system was down for a month and a half. No access to anything needed to operate the school or to communicate electronically!

How many other schools are vulnerable to such a disruption?

Regis University in Denver CO experienced something of that ilk in Fall 19