"Private Colleges Worry About a Dip in Enrollment" (New York Times)

<p><<a private="" school,="" pre-k="" is="" 23k="">></a></p><a private="" school,="" pre-k="" is="" 23k="">

<p>Holy goodness. I'm sorry, but I can't even fathom what a kid needs from a pre-school that costs that much. My son went to a city run daycare, all public schools in a city and with no SAT prep, got a 2250 and a big scholarship to NYU.</p>

<p>I hope the parents of kids who can fork over that kinda bling for pre-k are socking away just as much for their kids college funds. I smell future full pay students. </p>

<p>maybe I should get a bumper sticker that says "my public school educated kid can beat your prep school kid"</p>
</a>

<p>Not surprise
I think Public school should put some limit on international students
no offense</p>

<p>^ Whoa!!! Did they increase FRESHMAN enrollment by 200 students? Or did they increase TOTAL enrollment by 200 students? A "small LAC of 1400 students" has about 350 students per class. If they increase each class by 200 students, that's a 57% increase in size, and when the increase is fully phased in, they become a small college of 2200 students. That's a whopping increase!</p>

<p>But even if they increased the total student body by 200, or 50 per class---sure, anytime you increase enrollment by 14% it's going to be a significant event, financially and otherwise. It should increase (net of FA) tuition revenue by approximately 14%. If the school gets, say, 2/3 of its annual operating revenue from tuition, that's enough to bump up the annual budget by nearly 10%. Assuming the additional students don't require additional investments in dining halls, athletic facilities, classrooms, library space, faculty, or other common facilities and services, it should represent a pretty significant net financial gain to the college, after debt service on the new housing facilities. (I'm assuming the operating costs of the new facilities are fully offset by room & board charges to the additional students). I think we'll see a lot of pressure for small colleges to expand incrementally in just this way. But there's a price to be paid for it---higher student faculty ratio, bigger classes, more competition for existing facilities and resources, etc. And it's a fix you can't employ too often without fundamentally altering the character of the place, losing the scale and intimacy that made it attractive in the first place.</p>

<p>bclintock, I think that there are plans to increase entire enrollment by 200. I tried to verify that but could not find the info on their websites.</p>

<p>Oh, and one of these schools had an overcrowded rec center already, so a new "work out" facility was added into the new dorm.</p>

<p>
[quote]
But that still leaves the next cohort of schools---small private colleges and universities without the enormous endowments of HYPS---in a very precarious position right now.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yes, I agree with this. I remember the fall-off in college applications as the Baby Boom finished entering college, and a lot of colleges went out of business in that era. That was before people were as value oriented in shopping for a GOOD college rather than just any college. In my day, plenty of parents thought that most colleges were much the same, and worth paying for so that their children would be college educated. College loans generally had lower interest rates in those days too, and of course list price for tuition was a much lower multiple of typical household incomes than it is now. But some colleges still lost enough market share to go bust. More will in the next decade, I am quite sure. My FAQ is directly mostly at CC participants who are applying to the usual suspects among the most selective colleges.</p>

<p>The other part to this is that colleges are in the
business of producing grads for careers and grad
school. Not a lot of career opps out there right
now - half the grads I know are still in unpaid
internships. As for grad school, lack of funding
in the humanities and heavy undergrad loans are
impacting that. If the economic downturn goes on
for a period of several years, people will start to
question the value of the product - they already
are. High prices, lack of gov aid, huge competition
for students (clients) and a questionable product
doesn't bode well for many colleges, including some
with pretty large endowments. They are going to
have to prove they can produce for a reasonable
price and then market that effectively. The glory
days may well be over.</p>

<p>Significantly expanding enrollment has been the financial downfall of many liberal arts colleges. It costs more to educate a student than the tuition, thus every additional student (once capacity is reached and professors have to be hired) weakens the college financially. Per student endowment is king.</p>

<p>When Oberlin found itself out of equilibrium financially five years ago, their strategic plan called for REDUCING the size of the student body by 100 students.</p>

<p>After the huge increase in enrollment to accomodate women, Williams saw its per student endowment eroded relative to is competitors and has now gone almost 30 years without increasing enrollment.</p>

<p>Haverford wiped itself out of the top tier with an ill-timed growth strategy into a declining market in the 1970s. They have just now recovered.</p>

<p>interesteddad, you seem to know a lot about the financial situations at these top schools...question: do the ivies "sweeten" their FA for athletes? or do (as they say) treat everyone the same? I have heard of rowers getting extra money at some top ivies for example.</p>

<p>also, do you see a big change occurring next year with the private schooll's (top twenty schools like Vandy, NW , ND etc,,,) giving more money becasue if they don't they will drop in their academic standards and the U of MIchigan's will go up in standing becasue moe top kids will go to the public ivies</p>

<p>I don't get into financial aid packages. Every student's family has a unique situation and I think trying to draw conclusions about somebody's aid package is fraught with peril.</p>

<p>I know an athlete at an ivy and she got nothing.</p>

<p>Pinched colleges squeezing their alumni from LA times</p>

<p>Pinched</a> colleges squeezing their alumni - Los Angeles Times</p>

<p>How Much Has Harvard Really Lost? from Huffingtonpost</p>

<p>Edward</a> Jay Epstein: How Much Has Harvard Really Lost?</p>

<p>
[quote]

A good place to start that study (post #59) would be with Davidson. 66% full pay year after year in spite of being "need blind", and with a purported 98% of students having need fully met?
Hmmm....

[/quote]
</p>

<p>This is really interesting. Where would one find the data for this for Davidson and other schools?</p>

<p>^ The Common Data Set filings of each college. </p>

<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/76444-links-common-data-sets-posted-colleges.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-search-selection/76444-links-common-data-sets-posted-colleges.html&lt;/a> </p>

<p>For colleges that don't post their Common Data Set filings on the World Wide Web, much of the same information can be found in other Common Data Set publications, such as the major brand names of college guidebooks or (for many data items) the College Board College QuickFinder online data source. </p>

<p>College</a> Search - Harvard College - Cost & Financial Aid </p>

<p>College</a> Search - University of California: Berkeley - Cost & Financial Aid </p>

<p>College</a> Search - University of Minnesota: Twin Cities - UMN - Cost & Financial Aid </p>

<p>College</a> Search - Johns Hopkins University - Hopkins - Cost & Financial Aid </p>

<p>College</a> Search - Franklin College: Switzerland - Cost & Financial Aid</p>

<p>Much thanks!</p>

<p>I agree with many of the conclusions drawn above. At the risk of oversimplifying...</p>

<ol>
<li><p>If you've got your kid's college mostly or fully funded, cash is king (as usual) and you're likely to benefit in the next few years of private school admissions.</p></li>
<li><p>If you don't and were counting on a) your state university, b) an academic scholarship, or c) an athletic scholarship, unless your kid is the cream of the crop you were on the wrong side of this bet.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>So what are the (vast majority of) people in the second group likely to do? With the choices of stepping down to a lower scale state school or financing private school, I'd guess most will finance (like they did everything else). The problem is that this lowers the likelihood even further that the parents will be financially prepared for retirement, or puts the kids in hock before they start earning a dime. And unlike when the parents were recent grads, the prospects for earning a premium with your degree to pay down these loans is not guaranteed. There will be more qualified applicants coming out of the state schools with far less debt.</p>

<p>Eesh...not a pretty picture.</p>

<p>It just means that Berkeley and UCLA will be even more selective this year and in the years ahead. Parents are telling their kids forget MIT unless you get aid or will finance on your own. Go to Berkeley -- the fee difference is 25 K. What's not to like?</p>

<p>This does fly in the face of the UCs determination to lower standards. Wonder how all this will work?</p>

<p>pinkfeather:</p>

<p>The raw numbers are against your supposition. The Ivies+MIT only accept what, a few hundred kids TOTAL from California each year, of which some will still attend. But, even if they all turn MIT down (not a chance in the poverbial....), that is just a drop in the bucket as far as Cal-UCLA admissions go.</p>

<p>Berkeley and UCLA will be more selective, though, definitely. $25k difference will be the determiner for parents of admittees at plenty of top privates. Stanford, Pomona, Reed, Whitman, Harvey Mudd or Caltech at $50K a year, vs Cal or UCLA at $25K a year? Rice, Chicago, Carleton at $50K a year plus plane fare, or stay home and go to UCLA or Berkeley for $25K a year; plenty of parents are going to tell their children that they're going to a UC.</p>

<p>^ But you're mostly talking about kids from $100K+ income families here. Below that level, superior need-based financial aid makes the top privates competitive in net cost. Still, I think the pressure will be on more highly qualified kids in the $100K to $250K family income range to choose publics, while (perhps ironically) more kids in the under-$100K family income range will be drawn to selective privates by their generous need-based FA.</p>