Revenues & Rhodes Must Fall: Eduvation Insider for June 25, 2020

Thursday June 25, 2020

While much of the world is experiencing a second wave of COVID19 and inching towards 10 million cases, Atlantic Canada gets to live in a bubble starting next week, and New Zealand students get to have their convocations back! 

Less happily, Dalhousie is bracing for a $50 M drop in revenue, and Australia’s education minister seems intent on defunding the humanities (even though he himself is a grad).

Marketers may be inspired – or alarmed – that US for-profits are outspending them by 3000%, or that Dalhousie is investing millions in strategic priorities including outreach, enrolment and recruitment. (Either way, you should know!)

And perhaps most significantly: recent protests that #BlackLivesMatter, #RhodesMustFall, and we must #DefundthePolice seem to finally be having an impact on campuses, starting with statues, building names, and campus police forces!

The Global Picture

Convocations are Back in NZ

Now that New Zealand is back at pandemic alert level 1, postponed graduation ceremonies can get back to normal, starting in August with Auckland University of Technology. In September, Victoria University will hold 2 parades and 7 ceremonies, and in early October, Auckland University will hold 3 “mega-graduations.” Stuff

Australia to Double Humanities Tuition

Not only have Humanities research projects been vetoed by the Australian government, but now the education minister is proposing to radically reform university tuition fees and grants to reflect “21st century values and conditions.” The proposals are to “shepherd” students into “economically important” areas through course-level fee differentials. Annual fees would be lowered 20% for STEM courses, 46% for teaching, nursing, and psychology, and 62% for Agriculture and Math. However, fees for Law and Commerce courses would increase 28%, and Humanities and Social Science fees would more than double, increasing 113% (from $6,804 to $14,500). Current students would be grandfathered, so none would be worse off. Cuts in the government subsidy would reduce margins on domestic students to just 3%, from which universities support research. THE (1)  |  THE (2)  |  THE (3)

Boom Times for Online For-Profits 

While public and non-profit institutions face catastrophic finances amid the abrupt shift to online learning, the “winners” in this pandemic appear to be America’s massive for-profit online universities, whose stock valuations are surging. Normally they spend 30 times as much as publics on paid advertising ($400 vs $14 per student), but the 2008 recession boosted their enrolment 24%, and the lockdown makes their online approach ideal. Capella U and Strayer U were quick out of the gate with COVID19 campaigns emphasizing that “Great things can happen at home.” (Strategic Education, their parent company, saw profits rise 27% in Q1.) Ashford U is hiring 200 more “enrolment advisors” to handle incoming queries. American Public Education Inc. (which ironically is not public) saw its Q1 net income double over last year. Hechinger

#CdnPSE Finances

Dal Braces for $30 M Shortfall

Dalhousie U’s fiscal update, released yesterday, assumes the potential of a decline in tuition revenue of up to $37.8 M for the 2020-21 year, and $12.1 M lost from specialized programs and ancillaries. Enrolment scenarios forecast anywhere from a 14-29% decline in enrolment, but ‘the full impact of the pandemic will only be fully realized at tuition payment deadlines in the fall.” (Enrolment declines will continue to be felt for several more years, as those students are missing from upper-year classes too.) To cover the $30.5 M shortfall for next year, Dal plans to reduce operating expenses by $20 M, and use $12.2 M from its reserves. It has frozen senior admin salaries, restricted hiring, and is negotiating collective agreements and potential changes to pensions and benefits. Notably, a pool of $6 M will nonetheless be invested in strategic priorities, including international outreach, enrolment and recruitment. Dal

Quest Struggles with its Primary Lender

Quest U president George Iwama wrote last week that “Quest is at a turning point,” which seems an understatement. In addition to the COVID19 challenges faced by all institutions in North America, Quest’s primary lender, Vanchoverve Foundation, called its loan late last year and sought control of the board. Quest is under creditor protection “until the end of September,” and in negotiation with “several proponents” to pursue “options for long-term financial stability.” No word on who the “academic partner” might be – although Capilano University is also a secured creditor. Quest

#BlackLivesMatter

Calls to Defund Campus Police

Thousands of American students and faculty have signed petitions and held protests to urge universities to sever ties with law enforcement agencies and defund campus police departments, diverting resources to mental health services, crisis response, and affordable housing. #CareNotCops. Particular targets include the police departments at Harvard, Yale, the University of California system, and uChicago (one of the largest private police forces in the country). Guardian

Time to Stop Honouring Racists

For years, student protests and petitions have been largely ignored, and storied institutions have insisted on retaining the names of historical figures on campus buildings, colleges, plaques and statues. In the past month, though, the #BLM protests seem to have finally reached a tipping point around the world. The Clemson U board finally dropped Calhoun College and voted to rename Tillman Hall. uAlbama has removed 3 confederate plaques. James Madison U is renaming Jackson, Ashby, and Maury Halls. Monmouth U is renaming Woodrow Wilson Hall. uOregon is renaming Deady Hall. uVirginia has renamed Ruffner Hall in honour of its first African American PhD grad. uCincinnati is removing Marge Schott’s name from the baseball stadium. Even many HBCUs have buildings named for slavers or slave-defenders; Alabama State has begun to remove the names of KKK members from their buildings. And hundreds of other institutions have struck committees to consider building and college names, like the 26 institutions in the University System of Georgia. UNC Chapel Hill has lifted a moratorium on name changes that was imposed in 2015 and was supposed to last until 2031. In Canada, UNB is renaming Ludlow Hall. In Britain, uLiverpool is renaming Gladstone Hall. London Metropolitan U is renaming the Cass School. Even Oxford’s Oriel College is finally removing the statue of Cecil Rhodes. (In 2015 they argued that they would lose ?100 M in donations should the statue be taken down.) 

We may never see Yale or McGill change their names, but at least removing offensive statues and plaques is a symbolic gesture that eliminates some of the daily, passive microaggressions for students of colour. More significant will be efforts at affirmative action in faculty hiring, research centres, curriculum and student financial aid. 

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Ken Steele is Canada's leading higher ed futurist and strategic consultant, through his company Eduvation. He delivers virtual presentations and facilitates virtual retreats or workshops centred on emerging trends, enrolment management, pedagogical innovation, and strategic planning. 

Ken has developed 9 new topics specifically to help institutions cope with the post-COVID19 “new normal.”

For more information, please reach out to [email protected]