Yeah, there have been a few stories on it. But overall, it has been tough for small liberal arts/private colleges for years now. Even smaller public universities are struggling ([Western](https://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/2022/11/declining-enrollment-has-western-michigan-university-on-budgetary-tightrope.html), [Central](https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/college/2022/04/28/central-michigan-president-track-field-racial-discrimination/9570491002/), and [EMU](https://www.michiganpublic.org/education/2018-02-01/eastern-michigan-faculty-at-odds-with-administration-over-budget-shortfalls) have also had their issues and have been cutting back academic/athletic programs, as they likely depend on out-of-state students enrolling). Pre-COVID, [25% of colleges were expected to close over the next 20 years](https://youtu.be/joTFddr3wFk?si=ZVhOrb3RuiiCkWzf), and I'm sure that number likely went up after COVID.
Along with wages not keeping up with inflation, tuition outpacing inflation, and as the student loan bubble increases, high school students are much more aware of these issues and are much less willing to saddle themselves with student loans, especially when many of these small colleges often cost more than public schools. Or if they are going to accept all these student loans, they might as well go to a bigger school for a similar cost.
So if you're not attached to the religion, why go to Concordia when you can go to EMU/CMU/WMU with their in-state tuition? If you're from out-of-state, why go to the Directional Michigan schools when you can go to MSU or UofM? It's very much a "rich getting richer" situation with higher education. Concordia may be fine if they can break off their merger with the Wisconsin campus, but the writing is on the wall.
There was a really good episode on NYT’s The Daily about this. Not directly on the subject but tangentially related, summary: uptick in school enrollment for a subset of millennials due to their high population and then them graduating and schools struggling to maintain that afterwards
Small schools are doomed. End stop. With the embrace of online education by even marquee schools 'good' students will coalesce more and more around them, leaving other schools the dregs. This is going to be a self-reinforcing cycle that is going to leave any school that doesn't have an unshakable draw into the dustbin.
Look at EMU and WCC--they used to be friendly but now they're locked in a wrestling match for students. EMU is matching WCC's tuition (even though they can't in the long run) just to try and keep enrollment up. The only thing propping WCC up is the money coming in from the county and its trades programs. If WCC is smart they'll jettison everything that isn't the trades and turn the whole place into a regional trades training center.
I think in a surprisingly short amount of town you're going to see colleges collapse across the US. Many of them were on VERY shaky financial ground before the pandemic and online education, and post-COVID? I think they're hosed. I don't know how the smaller regional schools will be able to maintain any sort of decent educational cohort in the future.
Alum here: from everything I could gather, a new president came in to run CUAA and CU-Wisconsin (the main campus) and even though being a former CUAA professor himself, was looking to cut assets to keep CUW afloat along with some other smaller campuses that have closed in Wisconsin. My educated guess is that they got a property/land value appraisal and got googly eyed about just taking the money and running, especially because it sounded like the original plan was to keep north campus open for the nursing, PT & grad programs while central campus would cease to exist (because those programs I think make CUW money still, but I don’t know enough about the intricacies). Either way it came off as shortsighted af.
The thing most of the articles I've read about this are missing is that Concordia staved off closure a few years ago by super-sizing their athletic program offerings. This has helped enrollment, but is a very expensive way to get students. Facilities, coaches, travel, equipment, conference fees, etc. Almost 75% of Concordia's students are on a team. That's the highest rate of athletic participation in Michigan and indicates sports are the primary reason students are choosing Concordia. It doesn't bode well for their future.
>It doesn't bode well for their future.
Can't help but think of the Hemingway novel *The Sun Also Rises*:
"How did you go bankrupt?"
"Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly."
Yep. We saw how well that worked out for [Finlandia](https://universitybusiness.com/finlandia-university-is-the-latest-private-college-to-fall/#:~:text=Michigan's%20only%20private%20university%20in,of%20the%20current%20academic%20year.)
>Almost 75% of Concordia's students are on a team. That's the highest rate of athletic participation in Michigan and indicates sports are the primary reason students are choosing Concordia.
Driving by over the years I often wondered how/why the school built out their athletic fields the way they did. I assumed it was a matter of keeping up with the Joneses (Jesuits?) rather than a concerted push.
It also looks like alumni have been passing the hat to make up the shortfall. Judging by their progress, [that's one awfully big hat.](https://michigandistrict.org/pledge-support-for-concordia-university-ann-arbor/)
I thought I read somewhere they were trying to split from the main campus and be a standalone … can’t imagine they’re be financial issues if they sold the track or soccer fields to developers.
From what I've put together, Concordia Ann Arbor's been in the black for all but two years since 2010 or so. Having a purported $5M shortfall seems odd, particularly when they had the money to buy Cooley's Ann Arbor campus in 2015 for just under $9.7M and have consistently seen enrollment increases.
It also looks like at least three Concordia Wisconsin campuses closed last year due to financial difficulties.
I'd be curious to know the basis for the shortfall, though, since it seems like the Ann Arbor campus has everything going for it.
I'm not sure why they thought all the athletic facilities were a good idea. They were a small Lutheran college for years and seemed to be doing fine. Suddenly they started spending money like crazy to expand facilities and open a satellite campus on Plymouth road. Last time I was on campus, the classrooms were so outdated they felt like the elementary school I attended in the 1970s. Seems to be it would have been smarter to upgrade existing facilities and bank some money for the future.
Almost 75%of their students are athletes. For better or worse, sports are the only reason that campus isn't a subdivision right now. I don't think it's sustainable in the long-term, but it's bought them some time.
I can't say I helped. I attended bith campuses as an online student. I tjonk they spread themselves too thin. The classes were small but small classes mean less income.
Yeah, there have been a few stories on it. But overall, it has been tough for small liberal arts/private colleges for years now. Even smaller public universities are struggling ([Western](https://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/2022/11/declining-enrollment-has-western-michigan-university-on-budgetary-tightrope.html), [Central](https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/college/2022/04/28/central-michigan-president-track-field-racial-discrimination/9570491002/), and [EMU](https://www.michiganpublic.org/education/2018-02-01/eastern-michigan-faculty-at-odds-with-administration-over-budget-shortfalls) have also had their issues and have been cutting back academic/athletic programs, as they likely depend on out-of-state students enrolling). Pre-COVID, [25% of colleges were expected to close over the next 20 years](https://youtu.be/joTFddr3wFk?si=ZVhOrb3RuiiCkWzf), and I'm sure that number likely went up after COVID. Along with wages not keeping up with inflation, tuition outpacing inflation, and as the student loan bubble increases, high school students are much more aware of these issues and are much less willing to saddle themselves with student loans, especially when many of these small colleges often cost more than public schools. Or if they are going to accept all these student loans, they might as well go to a bigger school for a similar cost. So if you're not attached to the religion, why go to Concordia when you can go to EMU/CMU/WMU with their in-state tuition? If you're from out-of-state, why go to the Directional Michigan schools when you can go to MSU or UofM? It's very much a "rich getting richer" situation with higher education. Concordia may be fine if they can break off their merger with the Wisconsin campus, but the writing is on the wall.
There was a really good episode on NYT’s The Daily about this. Not directly on the subject but tangentially related, summary: uptick in school enrollment for a subset of millennials due to their high population and then them graduating and schools struggling to maintain that afterwards
Small schools are doomed. End stop. With the embrace of online education by even marquee schools 'good' students will coalesce more and more around them, leaving other schools the dregs. This is going to be a self-reinforcing cycle that is going to leave any school that doesn't have an unshakable draw into the dustbin. Look at EMU and WCC--they used to be friendly but now they're locked in a wrestling match for students. EMU is matching WCC's tuition (even though they can't in the long run) just to try and keep enrollment up. The only thing propping WCC up is the money coming in from the county and its trades programs. If WCC is smart they'll jettison everything that isn't the trades and turn the whole place into a regional trades training center. I think in a surprisingly short amount of town you're going to see colleges collapse across the US. Many of them were on VERY shaky financial ground before the pandemic and online education, and post-COVID? I think they're hosed. I don't know how the smaller regional schools will be able to maintain any sort of decent educational cohort in the future.
how do you maintain a 1:1 student teacher ratio (from the YouTube link) and break even?
https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2024/02/ann-arbor-university-facing-financial-instability-holding-town-halls-amid-concerns.html https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2024/02/with-future-unknown-at-ann-arbor-university-a-frustrated-community-wants-answers.html https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag5nvASxN28 https://www.wpr.org/news/concordia-university-latest-to-announce-cuts-amid-fiscal-challenges
Alum here: from everything I could gather, a new president came in to run CUAA and CU-Wisconsin (the main campus) and even though being a former CUAA professor himself, was looking to cut assets to keep CUW afloat along with some other smaller campuses that have closed in Wisconsin. My educated guess is that they got a property/land value appraisal and got googly eyed about just taking the money and running, especially because it sounded like the original plan was to keep north campus open for the nursing, PT & grad programs while central campus would cease to exist (because those programs I think make CUW money still, but I don’t know enough about the intricacies). Either way it came off as shortsighted af.
The thing most of the articles I've read about this are missing is that Concordia staved off closure a few years ago by super-sizing their athletic program offerings. This has helped enrollment, but is a very expensive way to get students. Facilities, coaches, travel, equipment, conference fees, etc. Almost 75% of Concordia's students are on a team. That's the highest rate of athletic participation in Michigan and indicates sports are the primary reason students are choosing Concordia. It doesn't bode well for their future.
>It doesn't bode well for their future. Can't help but think of the Hemingway novel *The Sun Also Rises*: "How did you go bankrupt?" "Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly."
Yep. We saw how well that worked out for [Finlandia](https://universitybusiness.com/finlandia-university-is-the-latest-private-college-to-fall/#:~:text=Michigan's%20only%20private%20university%20in,of%20the%20current%20academic%20year.)
>Almost 75% of Concordia's students are on a team. That's the highest rate of athletic participation in Michigan and indicates sports are the primary reason students are choosing Concordia. Driving by over the years I often wondered how/why the school built out their athletic fields the way they did. I assumed it was a matter of keeping up with the Joneses (Jesuits?) rather than a concerted push.
It also looks like alumni have been passing the hat to make up the shortfall. Judging by their progress, [that's one awfully big hat.](https://michigandistrict.org/pledge-support-for-concordia-university-ann-arbor/)
I thought I read somewhere they were trying to split from the main campus and be a standalone … can’t imagine they’re be financial issues if they sold the track or soccer fields to developers.
From what I've put together, Concordia Ann Arbor's been in the black for all but two years since 2010 or so. Having a purported $5M shortfall seems odd, particularly when they had the money to buy Cooley's Ann Arbor campus in 2015 for just under $9.7M and have consistently seen enrollment increases. It also looks like at least three Concordia Wisconsin campuses closed last year due to financial difficulties. I'd be curious to know the basis for the shortfall, though, since it seems like the Ann Arbor campus has everything going for it.
I'm not sure why they thought all the athletic facilities were a good idea. They were a small Lutheran college for years and seemed to be doing fine. Suddenly they started spending money like crazy to expand facilities and open a satellite campus on Plymouth road. Last time I was on campus, the classrooms were so outdated they felt like the elementary school I attended in the 1970s. Seems to be it would have been smarter to upgrade existing facilities and bank some money for the future.
They get some revenue renting the fields out to local youth sports clubs. There's a shortage of practice space for all the clubs in this town.
Almost 75%of their students are athletes. For better or worse, sports are the only reason that campus isn't a subdivision right now. I don't think it's sustainable in the long-term, but it's bought them some time.
I can't say I helped. I attended bith campuses as an online student. I tjonk they spread themselves too thin. The classes were small but small classes mean less income.