@psych_, I would not say a $40M endowment is big.
Just keep in mind 40 million means nothing as a major mess up can be Devastating. Yeshiva University is a great example they had a 1 billion plus endowment. Now they had to give up the medical school (caused a huge drop in their ranking), endowment is now around 500 million and they were forced to sell large parts of their real estate
@psych_ Forbes gives Erskine College a financial grade of C- See info here, be sure to research how Forbes comes up with these grades https://www.forbes.com/sites/schifrin/2017/08/01/2017-forbes-college-financial-grades-e-through-m/#25e7e9c55a80
@colfac92 yeah, I think Ken Burns is a household name. Article is behind a paywall. I had no idea he was a Hampshire grad! We lived in the same small town for a while 
Running list of college closures (includes both profit and for-profit)
https://www.educationdive.com/news/tracker-college-and-university-closings-and-consolidation/539961/
I’d take that list with a grain of salt.
Wheelock College merged into Boston University.
^^Agree on the merged ones, that’s strange…just sort by the ones that have closed.
I believe they listed mergers alphabetically, not by which institution, in fact, absorbed the other, See also Berklee and Boston conservatory.
Any thoughts on the strategy of Vermont with merging Johnston State College (enrollment=1400) with Lyndon State College (enrollment=1100) to form Northern Vermont University? Interestingly, they maintain the two separate campuses and the campuses are fairly fair apart (an hour’s drive), so I wonder how much they are really saving in this, even if it does reduce some administrative costs.
@scholarmin About a decade ago the Vermont legislature proposed merging all three state colleges into the University of Vermont. UVM had a fit and threatened to go private.
@scholarmin I would not underestimate the administrative savings…
Is UVM private? Because I was actually taking a class as an OOS student but dropped it this summer. the tuition bill was like $3,000 and the other university which I’m still taking a class online is $1272.
@colfac92, I wouldn’t overestimate the administrative savings, either. In my >20 years in academia, I’ve been part of a number of mergers at a lot of different levels, and one of the things that’s always been part of the argument made by administrators is a reduction in administrative costs—and that has never been the result. (In fact, in some cases administrative costs have gone up, even though there were now fewer units!)
@dfbdfb Of course administrative costs go up, since, for every low level administrative position which is eliminated, a higher one is created. The math goes: eliminate a departmental secretary and create a position for assistant dean of freshman satisfaction, and every administrator with the rank of assistant provost and above gets a 10% pay increase because the college is now larger.
There can be economies of scale in some back office type operations such fiscal, HR, and IT. The college where I work has a campus about 45 minutes away.
UVM is Vermont’s public flagship university. You knew that…right?
I doubt they can sustain two campuses at NVU for such a small state. I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t give up one of the campuses if they continue to decrease in enrollment.
I doubt any state university can threaten to go private. UVM is 27% instate?
Also, UVM is a Morrill land-grant institution, which AIUI creates some barriers to going private (MIT’s and Cornell’s land-grant status notwithstanding).
Not closing… but this can’t be a good sign:
https://vtdigger.org/2019/06/12/champlain-college-president-stepping-5-years-job/
Marygrove College cut undergrad programs, thinking that being grad-only would solve their financial issues. Clearly, that did not work out: https://www.freep.com/story/news/education/2019/06/12/detroits-marygrove-college-closing/1429771001/ .