Gotta disagree on that – the expensive, highly-selective small colleges (Davidson, Sewanee, Washington and Lee, etc) are doing just fine. Those are great places for undergrad education if you can get in. It’s the mid-to-low tier that is struggling. UNCA is an unusual case --it tried to sell itself as a small liberal arts college despite being part of a big university system so there were a lot of competing pressures. WCU down the road is still in pretty good shape.
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ECSU, WCU, and Fay St all offer discounted in-state tuition. That surely is helping.
These are tough times for many small private liberal arts, religious, and hcbu’s campuses. Endownments, debt, reputatation and perception all play a role. For ever W&L and High Point there is a Birmingham Southern and St Aug’s.
Too complicate it all the FAFSA form update is a total failure. It was suppose to be ready in Nov, and it is still not ready to go. Enrollement offices all over are freaking out. If you are counting on aid or loans, you do not know what your award will be. At what point to do just blow off college next fall. Then next year is the dreaded demographic cliff… we are going to see a lot of closures of pvt schools, and a few publics, this decade.
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In the end, it’s all about money. Whether it’s public or private, it’s the access to funding that’s going to allow a place to be successful or not. No dough? No go!
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i was there for a year or so in the late 90s…well regarded computer science, meteorology and physics
Relevant to St. Aug’s not being the only small college in dire straits (though they do seem to have that unique spicy edge of pretty obvious corruption)
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BSC made some really poor decisions fiscally - they went on a big building boom a la High Point, then eliminated all scholarships but cut tuition in half, etc - and regarding curriculum. There aren’t any signs or hints of corruption, but terrible management, expensive, and in an not so attractive part of town. It is a sad day, I know a lot of grads from BSC, but this the reality and future for many expensive liberal arts colleges.
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Indeed. There are exceptions (selective colleges, by definition, have their pick of students, and many also have huge endowments or research budgets that dwarf their educational activities anyways), but declining enrollment hurts less-selective colleges more.
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No updates since the summer of last year. They may be still going through negotiations. Proposals were due on 9/7/2023.
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This is wild if true. Jim Goodmon apparently wants to demolish Shaw University to develop the land, and have Shaw merge with St Augustine’s and take over their property. Orange Quarles and Smedes York were also there, rounding out the weird name convention.
“Raleigh doesn’t need two Black universities. We need the two to merge. I don’t care what you call it. However, we need them both on SAU’s property because we need downtown land to expand the development footprint.”
Also they’re alleging that after they refused, WRAL started running all the stories about how bad St. Augustine’s was doing.
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WRAL just lost all of its black audience after that.
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WRAL essentially being a local propaganda machine would be wild.
Jim Goodman is well I like to think of him as the Ted Turner of Raleigh but apparently he’s the Rupert Murdoch of Raleigh now. Don’t worry ABC11 has been the black news station anyway because of its Durham ties. It kinda reminds me of UPN (for those who are old enough to remember the was the default black tv network for shows like Moesha, the Parkers, or homeboys in outer space).
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To play Devil’s advocate here: St. Augustine’s is failing - whether you want to call WRAL “Propaganda” for running stories about its financial woes and internal corruptions, the facts remain. Merging with Shaw would honestly be a win for them - because the alternative is to slowly die out and shut down completely. Whether or not they completely move Shaw from its current campus/buildings and into St. Augustine’s, the idea to merge them isn’t necessarily a bad one.
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I’ve not kept up with this story super closely, but even if this were true I don’t see how it absolves the University and decision makers from what got them to this point and why merging might not be the best path forward on the merits. Seems like face saving PR to change the conversation more than anything.
Side note. Is the Shaw land even more valuable than St. Augs land? That would be surprising to me considering how much bigger it is. Or maybe Shaw has more land than I realize.
Double Side Note - Worst possible look here would be for developers to buy the land in this scenario and then sit on it which given recent trajectory of the industry seems most likely.
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We could have soooooo much parking, though.
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The idea of merging isn’t necessarily a bad one, and frankly I can see many benefits to developing the downtown core further. But I think the optics of a rich white developer trying to force 1 of 2 HBCUs downtown to move (the one that’s not failing) so the land can be developed, and then running hit pieces in the media he owns when they refuse, are terrible.
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Oh yes, that is for sure - however, predictable and unsurprising tbh.
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IMO, the Shaw campus has more going for it. Move SA into Shaw’s campus and redevelop the SA property into mixed use neighborhood with MM and AH as a draw along with the mix of cafes, shops, GROCERY STORE, hair salons, etc, that make up a thriving walkable community center. Shaw keeps its campus and its funky historic buildings and hopefully build some more modern dorms and classroom facilities with the influx of cash from the developers building around the periphery of campus, plus whatever the SA land fetches for redevelopment. Optics look much better to keep Shaw in place and move the struggling school to the Shaw campus.
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This was exactly my thought. Shaw can still be developed with infill density based on their plan from the rezoning, but I don’t see any reason why they would move and honestly think that would actually be worse for downtown.
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