Showing posts with label financial crisis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label financial crisis. Show all posts

Thursday, June 22, 2023

Simmons University plans to cut several liberal arts programs due to financial crisis

Simmons University, founded in 1902, is Boston’s only women's university. Although the school admits men to its graduate programs, its undergraduate school is restricted to women. 

Actually, that's not entirely true. Simmons admits transgender students who identify as women. Thus, an applicant who has testicles but regrets them is eligible for admission to Simmons.

Simmons boasts that 40 percent of its students identify as LGBTQ, and 34 percent identify as ALANA. ALANA is an acronym for African, Latino, Asian, or Native American. 

Despite Simmons’s niche as a women’s college and a college attractive to the LGBTQ community and women of color, the school is losing enrollment. In fact, the Simmons student body has shrunk by 11.5 percent since the fall of 2019.

Fewer students mean less revenue, and Simmons is struggling financially. The school ended its 2022 fiscal year with a loss of $14.5 million.

To reduce costs, Simmons is planning to cut some liberal arts programs, including its programs in philosophy, modern languages, and sociology. As might be expected, this move is opposed by some faculty members. One professor said, “Cutting out the humanities and social sciences is like cutting out the heart and then seeing if the body will still walk.”

Of course, professors rarely support cutting academic programs or laying off faculty members, even when enrollments are down. After all, fewer students in their classrooms mean fewer student papers to grade.

Lynn Perry Wooten, the University president, has tried to assure faculty members that their views will receive ample consideration. “[Y]es, some majors may go away,” Wooten acknowledged, “but it's [about] letting everyone have a voice in the change and then making a process that works” (as quoted in the Boston Globe).

Simmons is one of many small private colleges across the United States that are being forced to cut programs in the liberal arts and the humanities. In fact, it would be irresponsible for those schools not to eliminate academic programs that are no longer financially viable.

An undergraduate degree from Simmons University costs about a quarter of a million dollars, forcing most students to take out loans to finance their studies. A student would have to be nuts to spend that kind of money to get a sociology or philosophy degree from Simmons University or any other small private college.

 


  

 

Wednesday, November 7, 2018

Iowa Wesleyan and Valparaiso Law School make brave decisions: “It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done"

“It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done." Who said that? I think it was some dead guy from the 19th century. Charles Dickens maybe?

Iowa Wesleyan University and Valparaiso Law School both made brave decisions this week, and I salute them for it. Valparaiso Law announced it is closing after negotiations to transfer the school to Middle Tennessee State University broke down. And the President of Iowa Wesleyan University, Steven E. Titus, posted a statement on the university web site candidly telling the campus community that the university faces a serious financial crisis and that the governing board is pondering the university's future.

These decisions must have been very hard for both institutions. President Titus acknowledged that publicizing Iowa Wesleyan's financial situation might hurt enrollment, which could hasten its demise. "But we decided it was the right thing to let people know what was going on," Titus said. "There is risk no matter what we do."

As for Valparaiso, the loss of its law school diminishes the reputation of the university as a whole, as a law school is generally seen as a prestige-enhancing program.

In my view, both institutions are facing the stark financial reality that many private colleges are facing, and they are facing it with courage. Let's first look at Valparaiso. 

There are far too many law schools in this country, and enrollments have been declining. As reported in Inside Higher Ed, law-school enrollments have sunk from a high of 52,000 to 37,000. 

The quality of students being admitted to law schools is also declining. As tracked by Law School Transparency, a nonprofit group that reports on law -school admissions, some law schools have admitted students with LSAT scores so low that half the entering class faces a very high risk of failing the bar.

Valparaiso is closing its law school,  which is certainly in the public interest. It is far better for Valparaiso to close than for it to lower its admissions standards just to enroll more students.

As for Iowa Wesleyan, the school has been discounting tuition to attract students; according to one report, it has discounted tuition by more than half.  At some point that practice raises ethical issues.  How can a college justify charging its least attractive students full price when the average price is less than half that amount?

And how does a college explain the discounts to the students who receive them? Some colleges have been showering first-year students with scholarships--athletic scholarships in particular.  But is it honest to give an incoming student a volleyball scholarship when the school doesn't even field a decent volleyball team?

No, Valparaiso and Iowa Western should be commended for their courage and their honesty. It was a far, far better thing they did than perhaps anything they've ever done.

References

Scott Jaschik. Iowa  Wesleyan could become the latest small college to close. Insider Higher Ed, November , 2018.

Emma Whitford. Valparaiso Law School will close following unsuccessful attempt to transfer to Middle Tennessee University. Inside Higher Ed, October 31, 2018.

Sunday, February 12, 2017

St. Joseph's College is closing: Is the bell tolling for small liberal arts colleges?

St. Joseph's College, which was founded in 1889, is  shutting its doors in May. Officials cited several reasons for  closing: fierce competition for students, accreditation problems and increased federal regulation. St. Joseph's president, Robert Pastoor, said the college will need $100 million to reopen; and the college's friends and alumni are hoping to raise the funds.

Students organized a vote of no confidence against Pastoor and four other college leaders, but St. Joseph's decline and fall may not have been their fault. Small liberal arts colleges are in a precarious position all over the United States. The U.S. Department of Education has 500 colleges on its heightened-cash-monitoring watch list; and many of the schools on that list are small liberal arts colleges.

St. Joseph's, with only 900 students, just didn't have the resources to successfully navigate its way through rough financial waters. St. Catharine College, another small Catholic liberal arts college, announced it is closing less than a year ago. Like St. Joseph's, St. Catharine College cited increased federal regulation as one of the factors that brought it down.

By and large, the higher education community is made up of liberal Democrats; and almost no one protested the deluge of regulations that came out of the Department of Education during the Obama administration. Public universities, large private universities, and institutions with healthy endowment funds have been able to weather the tightening regulatory environment. Indeed, they have no choice. Virtually no college or university can survive without regular infusions of federal student aid money--and that money comes with regulatory strings attached.

Without question, many small liberal arts colleges are going to be squeezed out of existence over the next few years due to the same challenges that St. Joseph's and St. Catherine faced. Those that survive will have this profile:
  • Tuition rates below their competition; 
  • Strong academic programs that lead to good jobs such as jobs in medicine, health sciences, or criminal justice; 
  • High teaching standards; and
  • Endowment funds to buffer economic stress.
Many college and university leaders deplore the appointment of the new Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos.  You can probably count DeVos's higher-education supporters on the fingers of one hand.

But maybe college leaders should give DeVos a chance to address the financial crisis in higher education before attacking her. If she acts sensibly to trim the thicket of federal regulation, it is quite possible that more small liberal arts colleges will survive.

And surely that would be a good thing.



References

Meredith Colias. Rensselaer stunned after announcement of St. Joseph's closure. Chicago Post-Tribune, February 10, 2016.

Alexandra Kruczek & Alexis Moberger. St. Joseph's College president will call it quits in May. WLFI.com, February 9, 2017.

Another Small Private Closes Its Doors. Inside Higher Ed, June 1, 2016. Accesible at https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2016/06/01/another-small-private-closes-its-doors-dowling-college?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=a0fafeb056-DNU20160601&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1fcbc04421-a0fafeb056-198564813

Paul Fain. The Department and St. Catharine.  Inside Higher Ed, June 2, 2016. Accessible at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/06/02/small-private-college-closes-blames-education-department-sanction?utm_source=Inside+Higher+Ed&utm_campaign=3d1c6eed79-DNU20160602&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_1fcbc04421-3d1c6eed79-198565653