FB: Southern Athletic Association

[Ron Boerger]

The SAA yesterday announced the addition of indoor track & field as a sponsored conference sport.  Centre will host the initial championships at their new indoor six-lane facility in 2024 with the next year set for the Birmingham Crossplex (hopefully there is still a local school to host by then).  Smart move.

Per the release, all eight SAA schools are participating independently in 2023; qualifying in T&F is done on a time/distance/height basis so there's no Pool A/B/C and thus no minimum number of participants for NCAA championships. 

[Bmo]

Trinity and Southwestern are moving to the SAA.

https://www.trinity.edu/news/trinity-university-athletics-moving-southern-athletic-association

[cush]

Surprised they also don't add centenary. If BSC survives, any updates?, than jump to 12 with another Kentucky school, Transylvania or  Berea, so everybody has a travel partner. The Scac should absorb all the ASC schools, maybe Colorado college jumps somewhere, not sure where though, D2?

[jknezek]

Surprised they also don't add centenary. If BSC survives, any updates?, than jump to 12 with another Kentucky school, Transylvania or  Berea, so everybody has a travel partner. The Scac should absorb all the ASC schools, maybe Colorado college jumps somewhere, not sure where though, D2?

Haven't seen any updates on B-SC except for one editorial suggesting the state take it over and turn it into a "Hillsdale College" of the South. I don't think that is going to sway too many politicians, even down here.

[Ralph Turner]

Surprised they also don't add centenary. If BSC survives, any updates?, than jump to 12 with another Kentucky school, Transylvania or  Berea, so everybody has a travel partner. The Scac should absorb all the ASC schools, maybe Colorado college jumps somewhere, not sure where though, D2?

Haven't seen any updates on B-SC except for one editorial suggesting the state take it over and turn it into a "Hillsdale College" of the South. I don't think that is going to sway too many politicians, even down here.

I have questions as to whether the BSC "family" would want their institution being the Hillsdale of the South.

[jknezek]

Surprised they also don't add centenary. If BSC survives, any updates?, than jump to 12 with another Kentucky school, Transylvania or  Berea, so everybody has a travel partner. The Scac should absorb all the ASC schools, maybe Colorado college jumps somewhere, not sure where though, D2?

Haven't seen any updates on B-SC except for one editorial suggesting the state take it over and turn it into a "Hillsdale College" of the South. I don't think that is going to sway too many politicians, even down here.

I have questions as to whether the BSC "family" would want their institution being the Hillsdale of the South.

If they are going to close the doors without 35-40MM in state aid, or if the state was going to take it over completely, I'm thinking the "family" wouldn't have any say. If they want to save the school and their "say", they need to pony up now, and it doesn't seem like that is happening. I'd assume if B-SC was making good progress on their 200MM goal, they'd be trumpeting it loud and proud to show that this really will only be a bridge loan from public money.

But yeah, this was just a conservative education columnist spitballing an idea. I'd be surprised if it had any real backing.

[awadelewis]

Haven't seen any updates on B-SC except for one editorial suggesting the state take it over and turn it into a "Hillsdale College" of the South. I don't think that is going to sway too many politicians, even down here.

Nope, that one isn't viable.    The state system already has the University of Montevallo as its " Small Liberal Arts College".     And the Alabama Commission on Higher Education, with the most apt acronym for a government agency: ACHE, is already a  pretty right-leaning organization that would push UM in that direction first.

The Alabama Legislature is in special session trying to figure out what the state's going to do with the rest of its COVID money and then starts their regular Spring session on 3/14.   Should hear some more news once those things get really rolling.   There's some hope as the state Educational Trust Fund that gets all of the education related tax revenue has a fairly large surplus this year.  But that's a long shot.

[Ron Boerger]

So the SAA Council of Presidents (university presidents) had to approve this, and to be honest I'm surprised they did even with the likely loss of Birmingham-Southern, unfortunate as it is. They act on recommendations from the SAA Athletic Director's Council.  Given the history of the SAA leaving the SCAC for various reasons (travel, academics, Trinity's dominance of the SCAC all-sports trophy) there's something else going on here.  A guaranteed Pool A bid in football is nice, but is it that nice?

[Pat Coleman]

So the SAA Council of Presidents (university presidents) had to approve this, and to be honest I'm surprised they did even with the likely loss of Birmingham-Southern, unfortunate as it is. They act on recommendations from the SAA Athletic Director's Council.  Given the history of the SAA leaving the SCAC for various reasons (travel, academics, Trinity's dominance of the SCAC all-sports trophy) there's something else going on here.  A guaranteed Pool A bid in football is nice, but is it that nice?

Birmingham-Southern is obviously all the talk right now but I wouldn't be surprised if other SAA schools end up in a similar circumstance in the next 5-plus years.

[BSCpanthers]

We, BSC, have released our football schedule for '23.  Confidence is, I'd like to say high, but not quite, so I'll say confidence is good that we will still be a school in 2023.  Hoping something will come from the state soon and we can start looking for the future. 

[tigerguy]

So the SAA Council of Presidents (university presidents) had to approve this, and to be honest I'm surprised they did even with the likely loss of Birmingham-Southern, unfortunate as it is. They act on recommendations from the SAA Athletic Director's Council.  Given the history of the SAA leaving the SCAC for various reasons (travel, academics, Trinity's dominance of the SCAC all-sports trophy) there's something else going on here.  A guaranteed Pool A bid in football is nice, but is it that nice?

Birmingham-Southern is obviously all the talk right now but I wouldn't be surprised if other SAA schools end up in a similar circumstance in the next 5-plus years.

Outside of Millsaps, which has a $115mil endowment, what other SAA schools do you forecast having financial issues in the near future?

[Ron Boerger]

So the SAA Council of Presidents (university presidents) had to approve this, and to be honest I'm surprised they did even with the likely loss of Birmingham-Southern, unfortunate as it is. They act on recommendations from the SAA Athletic Director's Council.  Given the history of the SAA leaving the SCAC for various reasons (travel, academics, Trinity's dominance of the SCAC all-sports trophy) there's something else going on here.  A guaranteed Pool A bid in football is nice, but is it that nice?

Birmingham-Southern is obviously all the talk right now but I wouldn't be surprised if other SAA schools end up in a similar circumstance in the next 5-plus years.

Outside of Millsaps, which has a $115mil endowment, what other SAA schools do you forecast having financial issues in the near future?

It may be a numbers (enrollment) game rather than a strictly financial issue, but FWIW here are all the endowments with source (NACUBO are as of June 30, 2022)

• Trinity, $1,704,816,000 [NACUBO]
• Berry, $1,236,198,000 [NACUBO]
• Sewanee, $439,971,000 [NACUBO]
• Centre, $408,796,000 [NACUBO]
• Rhodes, $394,337,000  [NACUBO]
• Southwestern, $366,390,000  [NACUBO]
• Hendrix $200,900,000  Audit (Jun 2021)
• Millsaps $104,113,000  Audit (Jun 2022)
• Birmingham-Southern $53,984,000  Audit (Jun 2021)
• Oglethorpe $30,026,000  Audit (Jun 2021)

[awadelewis]

My take is that the SAA college with the worst prospects beyond B-SC is going to be Millsaps.   They've had financial and enrollment struggles for a number of years.    Their big issue of the moment is their enrollment base is, like B-SC's, heavy on the regional recruitment and they find themselves competing for those students with Mississippi College,  Belhaven, MUW, and the honors programs at Ole Miss and Mississippi State.   Figure that was one of the contributors to why Rob Pearigen decided to leave the President position at Millsaps and come home to Sewanee when our VC position opened last year.

[BSCpanthers]

Word on the street is BSC should hear something over the next two weeks, after BSC spring break, which is next week.  It has also been said that the government bailout may not be BSC's only option to survive this school year.  Time will tell, but hopefully we are getting closer to getting an answer, finally.

[BSCpanthers]

UPDATE ON BSC.............The request for money from the state was for $30 million, half from COVID money and half from the state education fund.  The state voted on the COVID money budget, the state is spending it on infrastructure, medical and rural internet expansion, so no money for BSC.  We are now hoping for all the funds from the states current billion dollar excess in the education fund.  I have a couple questions about that, first off being why do we have a billion dollar excess in our education fund when we need new schools and teachers in this state.  Second being when does that get voted on?  The school BoD has set the end of March as a deadline of a decision being made on the school. So essentially 10 days from now we should know if we still have Birmingham Southern College. 

Time is short, I don't have the most positive feeling at the moment.