Colleges in Dire Financial Straits

[apl68]

Closure announcements today:

Wells College, NY

University of Saint Katherine, CA

Either St. Katherine's students and faculty had more to say, or its closure was the more abrupt of the two.  Apparently the great majority of their students played sports.

[Hibush]

Closure announcements today:

Wells College, NY

University of Saint Katherine, CA

Either St. Katherine's students and faculty had more to say, or its closure was the more abrupt of the two.  Apparently the great majority of their students played sports.

"St. Katherine's was founded in 2010 and offered more than two dozen undergraduate and three graduate programs of study. It enrolled about 300 students." The article indciated that they mainly enrolled students who could not afford to pay tuition, which leads quickly to dire financial straits unless one has a major alternate source of revenue. They also had grandiose plans for a 5000 student institution on a brand new campus in Chula Vista.

[permanent imposter]

Another quote from the St. Katherine's article, from their Arts & Humanities department chair: "I need to find a new job. I have four children."

:(

[marshwiggle]

"St. Katherine's was founded in 2010 and offered more than two dozen undergraduate and three graduate programs of study. It enrolled about 300 students." The article indciated that they mainly enrolled students who could not afford to pay tuition, which leads quickly to dire financial straits unless one has a major alternate source of revenue. They also had grandiose plans for a 5000 student institution on a brand new campus in Chula Vista.

Do places like this actually have any long-term financial *plan before they start? Barring a billionaire benefactor agreeing to foot the bill, it's not remotely obvious how this could work in the long term.


*other than winning the lottery

[Hibush]

"St. Katherine's was founded in 2010 and offered more than two dozen undergraduate and three graduate programs of study. It enrolled about 300 students." The article indciated that they mainly enrolled students who could not afford to pay tuition, which leads quickly to dire financial straits unless one has a major alternate source of revenue. They also had grandiose plans for a 5000 student institution on a brand new campus in Chula Vista.

Do places like this actually have any long-term financial *plan before they start? Barring a billionaire benefactor agreeing to foot the bill, it's not remotely obvious how this could work in the long term.


*other than winning the lottery

Sometimes a school's bankruptcy is to be celebrated not mourned.

Wells demise is sad because they had a nice mission and campus, but they couldn't even get a thousand takers.

[Ruralguy]

Keep in mind now that many of the people now who have to look for jobs are regionally bound and may have some reasonable scholarship and other attractive qualities, but probably not the types to be top of anyone's lists. That would probably go for a lot of staff too.

Anyway, I doubt any of these schools really have much of a plan. They try to attract big donors, and when they don't, they have to make cuts, which rarely look attractive to prospective students, faculty or staff. If you have a large and flexible endowment, you could probably weather just about any storm, and it just becomes a question of when it just is pointless to have a dozen faculty, a few staff and a handful of students.  Of course, without the endowment, schools are forced to shutter when enrollment declines by too much too fast, and without any cushion (endowment, regular annual fund donations, grants).

[apl68]

Closure announcements today:

Wells College, NY

University of Saint Katherine, CA

Either St. Katherine's students and faculty had more to say, or its closure was the more abrupt of the two.  Apparently the great majority of their students played sports.

"St. Katherine's was founded in 2010 and offered more than two dozen undergraduate and three graduate programs of study. It enrolled about 300 students." The article indciated that they mainly enrolled students who could not afford to pay tuition, which leads quickly to dire financial straits unless one has a major alternate source of revenue. They also had grandiose plans for a 5000 student institution on a brand new campus in Chula Vista.

When you put it that way, you make it sound like somebody didn't think things through there....

[secundem_artem]

Thanks to all for the concern and good wishes for all the ongoing mishegoss at Artem U.  I'm personally safe and close enough to retirement that if the merde well and truly hits the fan, I am well funded for retirement and can just leave.

Earlier this week, the advisory body that was the next step in the process just spit the pacifier and threw all the toys out of the crib.  Were I the prez, I'd argue that they did not negotiate in good faith.  They have essentially ceded all decision making to the board and gawd knows what those guys may do.

Said advisory body seems to have recognized they shat the bed and are scrambling to come up  with a last minute, Hail Mary proposal to get in front of the board.  I'd offer that the proposals are about as effective as "let's have a bake sale".  Rather than dance with the devil they knew, now we all get to dance with the devil we don't.  Academic governance is a freakin' farce.  Nobody should take it seriously. 

Update.

All the tall foreheads and deep thinkers on the board punted.  No decision made.

Everybody knows something or somebody is gonna get cut. But nobody has the balls to wield the knife.

SO NOW FVCK1N6 WHAT!!!!???!!!

I'm inclined to ride this thing all the way to the bottom just to see how cowardly, incompetent, naive, foolish and generally stupid people can be.  I'll turn off the lights off on my way out.

My contempt for so-called faculty governance continues if the various wets and sob sisters cannot actually make a painful decision.  Putting adherence to mission over financial concerns is fine, BUT ONLY IF THE BLOODY FUNDS EXIST TO PAY FOR IT!! 

[apl68]

Sorry to hear that Artem U's leadership is continuing to put off tough decisions.  That will only make for tougher ones later.

As I said on another thread, I'm proposing to our Board of Trustees this coming week that we reduce service hours slightly, to recognize that we've reduced staff hours by letting a semi-retired staff member drop from full-time to part-time.  The savings will only amount to 2% of the budget, but it's a start on right-sizing our budget--and on what may end up being a greater long-term reduction in staff.  Doing some less painful things to save money now when we still have money in the bank will be better than using up all our reserves and then suddenly being forced into desperate measures.

[Wahoo Redux]

Update.

All the tall foreheads and deep thinkers on the board punted.  No decision made.

Everybody knows something or somebody is gonna get cut. But nobody has the balls to wield the knife.

SO NOW FVCK1N6 WHAT!!!!???!!!

Yeah, we've been living with this for the past 3 years.  That, and an admin which has no transparency.  Most of what we know comes from either the union strongarming an answer or a loose lip somewhere.

[spork]

Middle States Commission on Higher Education gave Keystone College a show cause order with a deadline of August 1. This is in addition to the demand that Keystone submit a teach-out plan by May 15. 

[jimbogumbo]

Keystone's most famous alum is Christy Mathewson, an inaugural member of the MLB HoF. That's not sayin' much.

[methodsman]

Thanks to all for the concern and good wishes for all the ongoing mishegoss at Artem U.  I'm personally safe and close enough to retirement that if the merde well and truly hits the fan, I am well funded for retirement and can just leave.

Earlier this week, the advisory body that was the next step in the process just spit the pacifier and threw all the toys out of the crib.  Were I the prez, I'd argue that they did not negotiate in good faith.  They have essentially ceded all decision making to the board and gawd knows what those guys may do.

Said advisory body seems to have recognized they shat the bed and are scrambling to come up  with a last minute, Hail Mary proposal to get in front of the board.  I'd offer that the proposals are about as effective as "let's have a bake sale".  Rather than dance with the devil they knew, now we all get to dance with the devil we don't.  Academic governance is a freakin' farce.  Nobody should take it seriously. 

Update.

All the tall foreheads and deep thinkers on the board punted.  No decision made.

Everybody knows something or somebody is gonna get cut. But nobody has the balls to wield the knife.

SO NOW FVCK1N6 WHAT!!!!???!!!

I'm inclined to ride this thing all the way to the bottom just to see how cowardly, incompetent, naive, foolish and generally stupid people can be.  I'll turn off the lights off on my way out.

My contempt for so-called faculty governance continues if the various wets and sob sisters cannot actually make a painful decision.  Putting adherence to mission over financial concerns is fine, BUT ONLY IF THE BLOODY FUNDS EXIST TO PAY FOR IT!! 

One way to have those funds to preserve mission would have been to cut programs and their associated well compensated boomer faculty with bloated TIAA CREFs teaching in programs that have long outlived their market value. But, presidents and provosts are chicken shit and afraid of votes of no confidence. And, they and the Vice President of Finance are making too much f'ing money to risk a good thing. They would rather ride it out as long as possible to an early retirement or college closure than make the hard decisions. They have mortgages on second vacation homes to pay you know.   And, no, contrary to popular belief, the growth in administrators is not the cause of most
institutions' demise.  Most programs return negative contribution to overhead to begin with. It's only aux services, grants, development and non rare occasions athletics and certain grad programs which brings the entire institution into the black. Yes, there has been an explosive growth in administrators, but that has mostly occurred at institutions that can afford it and where students and parents expect it. Medium and small institutions typically function with administrative understaffing relative to the workload.

Note: if your institution has bled 50% or more of its senior leadership in the last 3 years, enrollment is down 15% or more over the past 5-7 years, it hasn't recently gone thru a reckoning and your endowment is less than 150M, buckle up and dust off that ole CV. They are lying to you.

mm

[Dismal]

St. Cloud State in Minnesota announced plans to terminate 46 out of 136 degree programs.  See page 42 of this slide show:  https://www.scribd.com/document/729982751/St-Cloud-State-University-Budget-Update-May-6-2024#from_embed

St. Cloud apparently is the most worse off financially of all of the MN state schools.

[lightning]

Thanks to all for the concern and good wishes for all the ongoing mishegoss at Artem U.  I'm personally safe and close enough to retirement that if the merde well and truly hits the fan, I am well funded for retirement and can just leave.

Earlier this week, the advisory body that was the next step in the process just spit the pacifier and threw all the toys out of the crib.  Were I the prez, I'd argue that they did not negotiate in good faith.  They have essentially ceded all decision making to the board and gawd knows what those guys may do.

Said advisory body seems to have recognized they shat the bed and are scrambling to come up  with a last minute, Hail Mary proposal to get in front of the board.  I'd offer that the proposals are about as effective as "let's have a bake sale".  Rather than dance with the devil they knew, now we all get to dance with the devil we don't.  Academic governance is a freakin' farce.  Nobody should take it seriously. 

Update.

All the tall foreheads and deep thinkers on the board punted.  No decision made.

Everybody knows something or somebody is gonna get cut. But nobody has the balls to wield the knife.

SO NOW FVCK1N6 WHAT!!!!???!!!

I'm inclined to ride this thing all the way to the bottom just to see how cowardly, incompetent, naive, foolish and generally stupid people can be.  I'll turn off the lights off on my way out.

My contempt for so-called faculty governance continues if the various wets and sob sisters cannot actually make a painful decision.  Putting adherence to mission over financial concerns is fine, BUT ONLY IF THE BLOODY FUNDS EXIST TO PAY FOR IT!! 

Everyone, especially your administrators, have quiet-quit. You should do the same. And, as you say, "ride this thing all the way to the bottom."

One way to have those funds to preserve mission would have been to cut programs and their associated well compensated boomer faculty with bloated TIAA CREFs teaching in programs that have long outlived their market value. But, presidents and provosts are chicken shit and afraid of votes of no confidence. And, they and the Vice President of Finance are making too much f'ing money to risk a good thing. They would rather ride it out as long as possible to an early retirement or college closure than make the hard decisions. They have mortgages on second vacation homes to pay you know.  And, no, contrary to popular belief, the growth in administrators is not the cause of most
institutions' demise.  Most programs return negative contribution to overhead to begin with. It's only aux services, grants, development and non rare occasions athletics and certain grad programs which brings the entire institution into the black. Yes, there has been an explosive growth in administrators, but that has mostly occurred at institutions that can afford it and where students and parents expect it. Medium and small institutions typically function with administrative understaffing relative to the workload.

Note: if your institution has bled 50% or more of its senior leadership in the last 3 years, enrollment is down 15% or more over the past 5-7 years, it hasn't recently gone thru a reckoning and your endowment is less than 150M, buckle up and dust off that ole CV. They are lying to you.

mm

Not there, but could easily get there quickly if we don't remain vigilant and continue to hold people, especially administrators, accountable. Facilities and Administration ratios continue to creep up & up, thereby contributing to "negative contribution to overhead." BTW, Admin units ARE OVERHEAD. There are many admin overhead units on my campus, where if they were eliminated, students, parents, faculty, the community, research, etc. would not miss them. We have entire admin units (with buildings) where nobody, I mean NOBODY, knows what they hell they do. We routinely get admin visitors at program and college meetings, from these nebulous admin units, where they come explain to us what the hell they do, and how they contribute to mission. Sometimes they yammer on for 20 minutes or more. After they leave, the only thing I learn is that there is a lot of dead weight in our admin class. At the same time, these admin units are not required to do the same type of accounting as academic units. There is no "cost" that is funded with revenue by the admin unit itself. Rather, the admin unit's "cost" is factored into the costs of academic units, and those costs are creeping higher and higher.