What if There’s a Door #3?

“Strong integration” presents a new template for small colleges

Long before COVID-19, there were causes for concern among the nation’s small, residential, liberal arts colleges.

Demographics are changing – especially in the Northeast and Midwest – making prospective students much tougher to come by. And since, for institutions without billion-dollar endowments, meeting enrollment goals is the clearest path to generating necessary revenue, the competition in that dwindling student pool is getting much more fierce.

For most schools, that leads to varying degrees of tuition discounting. A report by the National Association of College and University Business Officers estimated that first-time, full-time, first-year students last year paid a national average of 53.9% less than full tuition. Experts tend to agree that this race to the bottom is unsustainable for hundreds of small colleges and universities – especially those located in rural areas.

So, in these troubled times, what’s a financially struggling small college to do? (Or, an even more appropriate question, what’s a financially-healthy-but-prudent small college to do?)

For proximate institutions, some kind of merger might seem a logical way to maximize resources.

But higher education is a field filled with proud traditions and passionate alumni.

So it’s not really surprising that recent numbers show more closures than mergers. It seems that many would rather ride it out till the bitter end than abandon their mission, identity and traditions to live on under another name.

Struggle on solo or merge into something unrecognizable? What if those weren’t the only two choices?

The College of Saint Benedict (CSB) is a women’s college located in St. Joseph, Minnesota. Saint John’s University (SJU), in nearby Collegeville, Minnesota, features an undergraduate liberal arts college for men (along with a co-educational graduate school of theology). For the last 50 years, the two have collaborated in what was formalized as a “coordinate relationship” in the 1980s. Academically, they are seamlessly linked. Administratively, several departments such as Admission and Human Resources have been coordinated for years. But in many other areas, the two schools have remained proudly separate. The spirit of their Benedictine, Catholic missions as a women’s and a men’s college demand distinction.

In 2019 though, their boards of trustees began to ask questions. Everyone agreed that their missions deserve distinction. But just how many things need to be distinct? Those questions launched a process that has resulted in new bylaws, a new joint operating agreement (JOA) and a new approach to the relationship – “strong integration.”

“This is the evolution of our coordinate relationship,” said Dan McKeown, chair of the SJU board of trustees. “It’s a leadership model that positions the schools to make strategic decisions to ensure the unique Johnnie/Bennie liberal arts education that was founded in our Catholic and Benedictine traditions continues and thrives in the future. And it was really made possible through a lot of hard work and enthusiastic support from our monastic communities.”

As it’s being implemented, strong integration between CSB and SJU will involve three major components:

1. Unified governing boards. Each school will continue to have an independent board of trustees. But those boards will be identical: having the same members, same committees and same officers.
2. A single president. One leader, pulling in one direction, will let the two institutions respond much more nimbly to changing circumstances in the economy, in higher education and in the world at large.
3. An integrated administrative culture. The new JOA identifies “common functions and services” that are being integrated together.

“This new model, while evolutionary, required approval from our accreditors (the Higher Learning Commission),” said McKeown. “Incredible diligence went into preparing an application of around 800 pages to support our new model. And, in November, we received a very favorable approval.”

So a nationwide search is on now for that first joint president of the two institutions. “Saint Ben’s and Saint John’s will attract a great new joint president,” said Saint John’s Transitional President James Mullen. “The institutions are strong and respected academically. And this is an opportunity to lead in implementing a national model of governance; to be at the center of something new and innovative in American liberal arts education. That is something any strong president would find exciting.”

CSB Board Chair Barb Brandes is excited about the potential for this new presidency. “The way this is being structured will give that new president the flexibility to advance the goals of greater unity and shared purpose while still maintaining the distinctive character of each institution,” she said. “In particular, we are adamant about preserving and advancing the essential role played by each in cultivating women’s and men’s leadership.”

For Saint Ben’s Transitional President Laurie Hamen, this process presents a solution for a scenario she’s seen played out before.?

She said, “There are colleges out there that are near one another and familiar with one another. And, in some cases, they’ve talked and talked and danced right up to the line of merger, but just never accomplish it because of the difference in their missions. And they walk away without sharing much of anything.

“But what if they had a template to follow? You don’t need to merge – there’s so much that you can do together without giving up on a distinct institutional mission. For many of them, a major reason they’ve shied away is that they aren’t sure their accrediting organization would approve it. They now have an example to look at and see, yes, this can be done. And when it’s done well here, I believe others will follow.”