Considering this limit would include Hillsdale, I have no doubt it will be magically raised to 600k per student before being debated...

Quote from: jknezek on February 26, 2025, 06:28:14 PMConsidering this limit would include Hillsdale, I have no doubt it will be magically raised to 600k per student before being debated...

Well reasoned, Jknezek.  This is the kind of cynical political analysis I can truly appreciate!

Quick math, it's $250m for a school of 500 students and increasing proportionately ($500m for 1000 students, etc).

We just had that big endowment list released.  I wonder how many d3s would fall into this range?

Quote from: Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan) on February 26, 2025, 07:15:34 PMQuick math, it's $250m for a school of 500 students and increasing proportionately ($500m for 1000 students, etc).

We just had that big endowment list released.  I wonder how many d3s would fall into this range?

https://www.collegeraptor.com/college-rankings/details/EndowmentPerStudent/

Not just D3s, but you could count them. It's roughly the first 50 schools on the list. Many are D3.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, (math and economics was never my strong suit) but this says it will only apply to places with "aggregate fair market value of assets of at least $500,000 per student."

So like, at Ithaca, which has 4,200 students, this would mean they would need assets of at least $2.1 billion for this increase to take place?

Now, maybe "assets" includes other stuff, but Ithaca's got a $373 million endowment and another $100 million is cash reserves, so well under the $2.1 billion.

Ithaca's not every institution, obviously. And again, maybe there's something more that go into assets (value of the buildings/land?). But they wouldn't even appear to be especially close. Obviously, the endowments will grow, so they may get there eventually, but it seems like this might be more targeted towards places with endowments in the 10s of billions than the smaller, liberal arts colleges and state schools that comprise most of d3.

This is not a partisan post based on anything, I'm merely trying to see if I'm interpreting this correctly

Quote from: IC798891 on February 26, 2025, 07:39:37 PMCorrect me if I'm wrong here, (math and economics was never my strong suit) but this says it will only apply to places with "aggregate fair market value of assets of at least $500,000 per student."

So like, at Ithaca, which has 4,200 students, this would mean they would need assets of at least $2.1 billion for this increase to take place?

Now, maybe "assets" includes other stuff, but Ithaca's got a $373 million endowment and another $100 million is cash reserves, so well under the $2.1 billion.

Ithaca's not every institution, obviously. And again, maybe there's something more that go into assets (value of the buildings/land?). But they wouldn't even appear to be especially close. Obviously, the endowments will grow, so they may get there eventually, but it seems like this might be more targeted towards places with endowments in the 10s of billions than the smaller, liberal arts colleges and state schools that comprise most of d3.

This is not a partisan post based on anything, I'm merely trying to see if I'm interpreting this correctly

See the link above. I counted over 20 D3 schools with endowments of more than 500K per student. So yeah, not a huge amount given the more than 300 schools in D3, but there were about 50 (I think 46 or 47) schools total that qualified according to the list just on endowment. If you add buildings and land, there will be quite a few more.

23 D3 on the list you linked to - and a fair number of them are pretty close to $500k per student, so they could theoretically just admit a few more each year to keep under the threshold.  Most of the schools near the top have huge endowments and can afford to pay just about anything, which is presumably what the bill is after.

The big loser is Berea, whose endowment goes almost entirely to funding poor kids' tuition.

This was a long-time coming for higher education.

When I was in college 2004-08, enrollment records were being set left and right at my institution and many others. Everyone was going to school. Admissions staff didn't have to work very hard because the applications were flooding in like crazy.

Then ever since the turn of 2010, the enrollment cliff has been falling, prices went up, the value from an education standpoint and facility standpoint (broadly speaking) have not matched it.

Take a look at many of these small private schools. Look at their facilities. In Wisconsin alone, you are seeing high schools left and right create indoor training facilities with field turf or domes. Pair that with how quickly you can learn business and communication skills online. Or save a ton of money by attending a 2 year/tech school. These small insitutions cannot keep up.

Eventually, this will all even out but not before we see many more small institutions close their doors.

Quote from: FiredCoachesPod on February 27, 2025, 10:09:14 AMthe value from an education standpoint

I would have to vehemently disagree with this.
 
https://educationdata.org/college-degree-roi#:~:text=Based%20on%20median%20salaries%20for,than%20associate's%20holders%20in%202025

https://www.aplu.org/our-work/4-policy-and-advocacy/publicuvalues/employment-earnings/

According to the above websites a bachelors degree, on average, nets you ~25K more a year than an associates degree, and a lot of other benefits. When I started working in the real world, my master's degree paid for itself in 2 years, based on the 5K more a year I got for just having it; and my bachelors paid for itself in just 4 years, as all of my loans were finished at that point.

The US still has lots of need for people without degrees of any kind, but to try to say that the juice isn't worth the squeeze, assuming you complete your degree, just doesn't hold up long term. It is 100% worth it from a financial standpoint, and probably at least 3 or 4 other ways as well.

It may take longer to see the impact if you've taken a ton of loans or taken more than 4 years to complete your degree, but the impact will still be there over the long term.

This is something I struggle with.

I went to one of the best communications schools in the country (tuition free, I should point out) for my journalism degree. Graduated Magna Cum Laude, went to grad school for a masters; graduated with a 3.7. I work in college communications at Ithaca College

My ex-wife went to DeSales for a film degree (completely uninterested in film, but her parents wanted her to go to college, also with a tuition discount). She had like a 1.8 GPA, so she got into sales. She quit that and became an administrative coordinator at a local non-profit here in Ithaca. Worked her way up the chain to marketing specialist, then moved to higher ed. Now works in communications for Cornell. It would be accurate to say she has a better job than me. And I'm not sure her degree has come in handy for her beyond it getting her past an automated screening process that checks a box —and I think she agrees.
 
It's anecdotal, but I think it points out a fundamental flaw, which is that while college degrees can be absolutely useful, they also can serve as a (very expensive) gatekeeper. And we need to re-think our processes here. I think, too often, the "College isn't the right path for everyone" gets bandied about when we talk about blue collar jobs, or going into trades, etc. But it doesn't go far enough, IMO. Not every professional career job needs to have a bachelor's degree requirement attached to it.

Washington College Board of Visitors and Governors Meeting Addresses Hiring and Budget Concerns

QuoteDuring committee reports, Academic Affairs and Student Success chair Kirk Johnson addressed the need to reduce the number of faculty due to struggles with enrollment.

Johnson said Washington College budgeted for cutting five positions but now must make ten faculty cuts in response to budget and student-to-faculty ratio concerns.

QuotePresident of the College Dr. Mike Sosulski addressed higher institution issues, including inflation and increased costs. He has been working in Annapolis to argue that smaller universities with less than 5,000 students should receive money from the Sellinger Grants. 85% of this money goes to scholarships for Maryland students, but this pool has been cut in half. The group is proposing another 50% cut, making it a quarter of what it once was.

QuoteFinancial Affairs and Operational Sustainability Chair Peter Maller also discussed ways to reduce expenses, including payroll cuts and focusing on retention rates among the freshmen and sophomores. One solution is encouraging students to declare their major during their sophomore year to help commit them to their program and academic goals.

While listed tuitions have increased, *net* tuitions have not (or have not gone up nearly as much as list price).   And there's a lot more I could say, but invariably it veers into political discussions and that's not what these boards are for.

[as an aside, "fair market value of assets" would include plant and property by the usual definition of the term] Edit:  The original bill refers only to endowment assets

Quote from: IC798891 on February 27, 2025, 01:00:44 PMAnd we need to re-think our processes here. I think, too often, the "College isn't the right path for everyone" gets bandied about when we talk about blue collar jobs, or going into trades, etc. But it doesn't go far enough, IMO. Not every professional career job needs to have a bachelor's degree requirement attached to it

I absolutely agree. There are a ton of jobs that can be done competently without a bachelor's degree, many that probably require one. In many ways academia is kind of a pyramid scheme, that admittedly I love and would buy into again. But as I said in an earlier post, I don't think that every degree has to have a real world job that corresponds to it exactly. When people ask me why I love the liberal arts, I always answer the exact same way. "The world moves pretty fast. And if you're not good at learning, you're not going to make it. The liberal arts isn't about facts, it's about learning how to learn - learning how to be curious, learning how to adapt and adopt."

The exact degree doesn't always matter, but the lessons you learn should. And that's not always something you can measure on a test. I'm sure you can think of people that embody that spirit though, and those are the kinds of employees people are often looking for.

Quote from: Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan) on February 27, 2025, 09:10:22 AM23 D3 on the list you linked to - and a fair number of them are pretty close to $500k per student, so they could theoretically just admit a few more each year to keep under the threshold.  Most of the schools near the top have huge endowments and can afford to pay just about anything, which is presumably what the bill is after.

The big loser is Berea, whose endowment goes almost entirely to funding poor kids' tuition.

As mentioned in an earlier discussion, most of Berea's annual budget surprisingly comes from annual fundraising.  Losing 21% of the annual profit earned by the endowment as this bill proposes (not the base endowment), while *far* from ideal, would actually hurt it less than the schools on this list who depend much more on their endowment to offset costs.  Please don't read this as me being in favor of this proposal, btw. 

But endowments also lose money, for example, when the market takes a hit, endowments generally do too.  I'm sure this bill will *not* allow colleges any sort of recompense should this occur.

Penn State announces it plans to close some of its branch campuses

QuoteIn a message posted to Penn State's website, Bendapudi said the university's seven largest undergraduate branch campuses - Abington, Altoona, Behrend, Berks, Brandywine, Harrisburg, and Lehigh Valley - will remain open.

But the other 12 will be scrutinized for closure by an internal team that will deliver a recommendation to Bendapudi for a decision she said she'll deliver by spring commencement.