Public Universities Closing?

[jerseyjay]

I was talking to a colleague at another university, who was describing the financial situation at his  university. Evidently the school has a multi-million dollar budget hole combined with declining enrollment and has been laying people off, and there is worries that it might not have enough money to open up for the fall semester. Unfortunately, this is not a unique situation and I know that there are various schools in this situation that have closed entirely (Dowling College, College of New Rochelle, etc.) or been forced into some kind of shotgun wedding (Bloomfield College).

What makes this unique is that this is a public university; it is not the flagship school, but a comprehensive state university. His school is not in any accreditation trouble,  still has thousands of students, is located in a growing part of the state, and is in a state that has a budget surplus. It would seem that the current financial problems are due to a combination of decades of decreasing state funding, a secular enrollment decline, and poor decisions by the administration. My friend seemed to think that the school was in danger of shutting down, while I think that it is unlikely that a state would just close a public university. It would seem more likely that they require significant changes, but not just closing it. I know of examples of mergers of public universities (Connecticut, Maine) but not of any university shutting its doors entirely. My friend disagrees. My question is, has there been a case recently of a public university that has actually closed?

[Parasaurolophus]

There was The School of Architecture at Taliesin, in Wisconsin, in 2020, wasn't there?

[Ruralguy]

A lot of this depends on location and expertise. They might attempt a merger if there were anything to merge.
if you are really asking whether anything is safe but flagships and other prestigious state schools (such William and Mary) then probably not. Even flagships will experience deep cuts if theres a recession.

[dismalist]

My question is, has there been a case recently of a public university that has actually closed?

Yes, many. Public 4-year number of colleges declined by 18 from from 2020 to 2021.

The article https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2021/08/02/number-colleges-shrinks-again-including-publics-and-private-nonprofits contains an easy to understand table. Its words add nuance.

My impression is that "restructuring" might be tried first. Doesn't anyone remember what happened to Pennsylvania's publics?

The Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education's Board of Governors has approved the most transformative restructuring in the system's 38-year history, as it voted Wednesday to consolidate six state-owned universities into two regional campuses.

From here:

https://www.penncapital-star.com/education/pa-state-system-unanimously-moves-to-consolidate-six-schools-into-regional-campuses/

[Wahoo Redux]

I am wondering about our---check----my wife's current employer.

We hemorrhaged another 4% decline in enrollment for the fall semester from this time last summer.  The president is the first rat jumping ship (and there is the teeniest, tinniest ray of hope there), they have cut majors and sliced and diced departments, and I suspect we are seeing the inevitable spiral fewer students = fewer classes = fewer majors = fewer classes offered = fewer students = fewer classes etc. ad nauseum.   Already instructors have been given hard limits on their classes and a number will be cancelled by fall.

Some time go Polly argued that a better course of action in these times is to close redundant satellite campuses and concentrate resources in huge flagship campuses.  And this maybe makes sense.  Our---check----my wife's campus is overall a very mediocre educational institution.  Instead of having a constellation of over-budget, dying, mediocre campuses, maybe we should have one fantastically good massive flagship.

[mamselle]

Maybe even contraction at the externals with an eye to re-expansion later if warranted?

Something like breathing, with the possibility of retaining any buildings owned but doing long-term leases on them as, say, office or lab spaces, to generate income, while not running that satellite as a campus per se.

I'm seeing something similar in the way elementary schools are being built in some places. After the extreme population contraction that led, a couple decades ago, to the closing and re-purposing of many schools (with several becoming eldercare units), the appearance of new/replacement schools for buildings that needed to be overhauled (to such a degree that a few repairs wouldn't be enough) look eerily like proto-apartment buildings to me.

Perhaps they're building with adaptive re-use in mind.

M.

[Mobius]

I think of metro Atlanta with at least seven public universities an hour or so away from downtown. Several institutions are ripe for merger.

[Caracal]

I think of metro Atlanta with at least seven public universities an hour or so away from downtown. Several institutions are ripe for merger.

Maybe? Metro Atlanta is a huge area. Most of those schools serve very different groups of students. Ga State is a huge urban university. Ga Tech is a smallish elite school for Engineering and Computer Science. UGA is the state flagship. The others have lots of commuter students and there are geographic needs. Its all well and good to say a school should merge, but if you're on the far south side of the metro area, it is a huge hike to the North.

[mamselle]

And the only ones I know of, like the seminaries, are of very different denominational flavors....Emery and Columbia Theological School, for example,  come from rather different places on the confessional spectrum.

Politics may make strange bedfellows; religion even more so.

M.

[apl68]

Its all well and good to say a school should merge, but if you're on the far south side of the metro area, it is a huge hike to the North.

Isn't that the truth!  Atlanta is like Nineveh--it feels like it takes three days to pass through it.

Although some public campuses will no doubt be closed outright in the years to come, I would think that more often they would be downgraded but still kept in business at some level.  Like the way poor Henderson State University has just been reduced to little more than a vo-tech school.  Most state college systems were deliberately designed to give each regional college its own long-term regional constituency.  There will be a lot of pressure to keep campuses open, even if they end up downsized.

[mamselle]

Isn't that the truth!  Atlanta is like Nineveh--it feels like it takes three days to pass through it.

For sure. Peachtree alone is like a small incorporated town...!

M.

[Mobius]

Places like Clayton State aren't going to have a chair when the music stops. Not saying that should happen, but cuts to places like that are coming.