Posted on 08/02/2023 2:12:12 PM PDT by Morgana
Alderson Broaddus University (ABU), a Baptist school in West Virginia, finds itself in the middle of a significant financial crisis and is on the brink of shutting down. This week, during an emergency meeting of West Virginia’s Higher Education Policy Commission and other state officials, the decision was made to pull its authorization while also preparing an order that calls for the school to wind down operations.
Having ABU’s authorization pulled means it will no longer be able to confer degrees after December 31 of this year. The order to wind down the operation of the school is a wide reaching mandate that includes some of the following steps, among others:
– ABU cannot accept, admit or enroll new students beginning with the Fall 2023 semester.
– No students can return to campus this Fall, except for seniors set to graduate in the Fall semester.
– All athletic and extracurricular activities must end immediately.
– All students, except for seniors set to graduate this semester, must be reimbursed for all tuition and fees related to the Fall semester.
ABU has existed for nearly a century but has fallen into financial hardship over the last decade. According to Rebecca Hooman, who recently resigned as chairperson of the school’s Board of Trustees, enrollment began to drop significantly starting in 2011. In the years that followed, Hooman says that from 2011 to 2015, “the business office was not adequately staffed, nor did they have the tools to produce timely, accurate reports on our financial situation.”
From there, the decline progressed. Tax filings from 2020 show ABU held more than $37 million in liabilities with a net income of only around $904,000. The school’s most significant piece of debt is a $27 million loan it had taken out from the U.S. Department of Agriculture in 2018. The loan allowed ABU to stay afloat.
The school was informed last week by the City of Philippi that its utilities—water, sewer, electric, and garbage—were set to be terminated on July 31 because of an outstanding balance that totaled $775,598. According to a filing with the Public Service Commission of West Virginia, the last time ABU was current on its utilities was August 2021.
Keeping up with payroll has been an issue for ABU in recent weeks. The school has been seeking donations from alumni to make their couple payrolls, including the one due this Friday, August 4. Dr. Sarah Armstrong Tucker, West Virginia’s chancellor of higher education, told Metro News, “Given the financial information I’ve provided thus far, a mid-semester closure seems to be inevitable, leaving the students at grave financial and academic risk.”
This is a closure that many in West Virginia government leadership want to avoid. West Virginia Governor Jim Justice said, “No one wants to see this university close if there’s a way to avoid it. It may very well be inevitable, but we’re going to try really hard to find a pathway.”
Justice said a closure would affect many more West Virginians than just the students. “It’s simply too important, not only for this prestigious university and its alumni, but also for the entire community of Philippi and Barbour County.”
West Virginia State Senator Rollan Roberts told WJLS AM that ABU’s troubles could be a sign of things to come for other higher education institutions in West Virginia. “I think we’re going to hear some more of these things in the next few years,” Roberts said, “because the landscape has changed with higher ed and the numbers are going to go down, so can we sustain the same amount of universities in West Virginia?”
There is a glimmer of encouraging news for students of ABU. West Virginia Wesleyan College, in nearby Buckhannon, distributed a statement saying it “stands ready to serve all current or incoming Alderson Broaddus students at this difficult time. We will provide these students with fast and free priority application and thorough transcript evaluations.”
Here in Fort Worth, Texas Wesleyan U. is suffering a slow, similar fate, although it is leftist through and through.
It probably fell into hard times by not staying tight in what it can offer.
The DoA is a Bank? How does THAT work?
The university probably told the Department of Agriculture that they were training farmers.
DoA makes loans on rural property and to rural institutions.
The local fire dept got a combination loan and grant to buy a tanker.
That’s what I was wondering as well. Many of them were founded that way and in recent years strayed from their mission and founding. There’s little reason to pay all of that extra cash if you are just going to get the same woke nonsensical “education” as you would get at a state funded school - not to mention they would lose donors and / or funding from state Christian associations that they used to partner with.
Puritans established Harvard College in 1636, shortly after arriving in Massachusetts Bay. Harvard’s mission statement, given in 1642, was clearly evangelical: “Everyone shall consider as the main end of his life and studies, to know God and Jesus Christ, which is eternal life. John 17:3.” The Harvard motto, from 1650, emphasized its core Christian commitment: “In Christi Gloriam” (“For the glory of Christ).”
-- Liberty Journal (Liberty University)
Now look at it.
Sounds like Student Loans being federalized.
The DoA should not be a Bank.
Sounds like Student Loans being federalized.
The DoA should not be a Bank.
enrollment began to drop significantly starting in 2011. In the years that followed, Hooman says that from 2011 to 2015, “the business office was not adequately staffed, nor did they have the tools to produce timely, accurate reports on our financial situation.”
In situations like this there are too many prior bad decisions. Or as someone told me in prison ministry. They can’t make two good decisions in a row.
Was Bernie Sanders’s wife the Dean?
It could be the leading edge of the “Demographic Cliff” that will hit 18 years after the 2007 recession and result in a significant drop in incoming college freshmen. Top ranking schools typically have an endowment to help get through the student drought, and they can also relax their admission standards, if needed.
But lower-tier, low-endowment, private schools that live primarily off tuition will have a harder time. Even if they accept all the students that apply, those who have little academic qualifications will end up dropping out before graduating, requiring even more freshmen to replenish the loss of tuition.
Look for more college closings over the next five years.
Btt
I am somewhat surprised the state chose to pull the plug given the looming '24 election. AB is/was private but there were those clamoring for a bailout or takeover by the state.
Of course if the truth be known, WVU and Marshall are looking at downsizing due to soaring expenses and dwindling enrollment.
prestigious
????
That being said, there are a lot more small colleges that are unlikely to survive. Montreat and Sweetbriar postponed the inevitable a few years ago. Sweetbriar in a less than ethical fashion.
I don't recall the details. Did they sell their law school, or just naming rights to the school?
I have a friend that graduated from there in the late 1970s he went to seminary afterwards (Eastern Seminary in Philidelphia) both are ABCUSA, he, and those colleges are quite liberal even back then, Eastern being more liberal though. It should be said plainly that ABUs campus is quite nice.
But I don’t want to say ABUs problems are simply one of their lack of theological underpinnings. I went to Salem College which is located about 50 miles from ABU also founded as a Baptist college but independent back then (also late 70s) both colleges were small but starting to show signs of financial woe. Salem is still open but a ghost of it’s former self and the city of Salem (WV) looks haunted.
So part of it is the colleges lack of focus and fiscal discipline and also the general decline of the economy of central West Virginia.
This is though really sad news. I’m not sure how stable West Virginia Wesleyan or Davis and Elkins Colleges are doing, those are the other private colleges in central WV
Academic staff 53 Full-Time and 25 Part-Time[1]
Students 863 (766 undergraduate)[1]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alderson_Broaddus_University
Too small scale to function as a university.
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