PASSHE Institutions Merging

[complaint_hopeful]

Do you have any thoughts on the original question?

Everybody knows that it's 1 budget for 3 schools.

Hopefully, the reserves of the individual schools are off limits to the neediest. If not, that would be grossly unfair and a reason to nix the whole deal. They'll use the reserves to balance the budgets if they have to. Hopefully 1 or 2 of the schools will have enough growth to offset losses from 1.

So, what you have here is Mansfield borrowing to stay alive. But Mansfield is no longer self-supporting. The other schools in the triad will have to absorb this debt in the same way the rest of the system absorbed all of the Cheyney debt. Cross-subsidization at its finest!

It's precisely the reason they did the Triads. They knew that Mansfield and a few other schools were going to start to fail financially.

So without the Triad and Mansfield failing...yeah it moves towards disolving or maybe offering a small array of programs. In the Triad, they can just get rid of a lot of employees/costs and continue to offer other programs. Now some might be online or hybrid, but you'll be able to take more programs there.

The Chancellor has said numerous times that 'reserves' don't necessarily belong to individual schools and that PASSHE is essentially 1 bank account. I think asking if that is fair or not is a great question too.

And in these Triads, how are they going to distribute funds? Like Bloom is doing good and can afford more stuff. Are they going to try to catch LH and Mansfield up in campus improvements by diverting money from Bloom?

I have a ton of questions.

The Mansfield situation kind of explains why they're pushing these integrations at such a frantic pace though. They couldn't wait 2-3 more years.

[Fightingscot82]

Do you have any thoughts on the original question?

Everybody knows that it's 1 budget for 3 schools.

Hopefully, the reserves of the individual schools are off limits to the neediest. If not, that would be grossly unfair and a reason to nix the whole deal.

So, what you have here is Mansfield borrowing to stay alive. But Mansfield is no longer self-supporting. The other schools in the triad will have to absorb this debt in the same way the rest of the system absorbed all of the Cheyney debt. Cross-subsidization at its finest!

I believe the reserves of the triad would be combined, so yeah what were once Bloom and Lock Haven reserves will be depleted to cover the Mansfield losses. I don't believe Bloom and LH reserves will exist in exclusivity after integration. Kind of like when I got married I suddenly had to take on paying my wife's student loans.

[iupgroundhog]

That's where the Integration comes in. It's 1 budget for 3 schools. That should enable them to offer a variety of classes...

Of course, until they deplete the reserves of the Triad. Hopefully that doesn't happen. I have no clue what Bloom and LH's finances look like.

Do you have any thoughts on the original question?

Everybody knows that it's 1 budget for 3 schools.

Hopefully, the reserves of the individual schools are off limits to the neediest. If not, that would be grossly unfair and a reason to nix the whole deal.

So, what you have here is Mansfield borrowing to stay alive. But Mansfield is no longer self-supporting. The other schools in the triad will have to absorb this debt in the same way the rest of the system absorbed all of the Cheyney debt. Cross-subsidization at its finest!

[Fightingscot82]

That's where the Integration comes in. It's 1 budget for 3 schools. That should enable them to offer a variety of classes...

Of course, until they deplete the reserves of the Triad. Hopefully that doesn't happen. I have no clue what Bloom and LH's finances look like.

LHU recently claimed to have $45-50M cash reserves. This article from October 2020 has reserve totals for the system as of June 2019. I can't find anything newer.

https://www.post-gazette.com/news/ed...s/202010080115

[complaint_hopeful]

Interesting. Will Mansfield just evolve/devolve into a music academy where you can also study other things, but only online?

That's where the Integration comes in. It's 1 budget for 3 schools. That should enable them to offer a variety of classes...

Of course, until they deplete the reserves of the Triad. Hopefully that doesn't happen. I have no clue what Bloom and LH's finances look like.

[iupgroundhog]

Some highlights of the April 15 system BOG agenda:
- Millersville is borrowing $140M+ to buy housing from an auxiliary.
- Mansfield is borrower $7M to stay afloat this year. This means Mansfield is running a big deficit this year and is out of reserves (savings). YIKES

Interesting. Will Mansfield just evolve/devolve into a music academy where you can also study other things, but only online?

[Fightingscot82]

Interesting points. I think we won't know until the presentation to the board just how much of this is the Chancellors/Consultants plan vs how much is the committees.

Looks like this won't be presented to the board until the 28th:
Board of Governors Meeting Information | PA State System of Higher Education (passhe.edu)

Some highlights of the April 15 system BOG agenda:
- Millersville is borrowing $140M+ to buy housing from an auxiliary.
- Mansfield is borrower $7M to stay afloat this year. This means Mansfield is running a big deficit this year and is out of reserves (savings). YIKES

[complaint_hopeful]

https://www.mcall.com/opinion/mc-opi...nhy-story.html

Interesting points. I think we won't know until the presentation to the board just how much of this is the Chancellors/Consultants plan vs how much is the committees.

Looks like this won't be presented to the board until the 28th:
Board of Governors Meeting Information | PA State System of Higher Education (passhe.edu)

[Fightingscot82]

https://www.mcall.com/opinion/mc-opi...nhy-story.html

[complaint_hopeful]

You've posted this several times. Can you provide the reference so all of us can get angry?

From the current Appropriations request linked to in previous post:

At this funding level, Pennsylvania ranks 48
th of 50 states in terms of educational appropriation per student Full Time Equivalent (FTE), representing a decline from FY 2018, where Pennsylvania was ranked 47th (Figure 19). Additional data from the State
Higher Education Executive Officers Association (SHEEO) lists Pennsylvania as ranked 47th in net tuition per FTE, spending $3,719 per student less than the 50-state average.

[complaint_hopeful]

So what you meant to say was "PASSHE released a tweet" and not the "state released a report".

Here's the newest PASSHE Appropriations request. In it, they have this:

Economic impact
According to a study conducted by Baker Tilly Virchow
Krause, LLP in 2015, State System universities contributed $4.4 billion in economic impact to Pennsylvania, representing $10.61 for every one dollar of public funds expended on the State System that year.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...=1617841364181

[complaint_hopeful]

You've posted this several times. Can you provide the reference so all of us can get angry?

https://www.thecentersquare.com/penn...1cfd5e8fb.htmlhttps://www.inquirer.com/business/st...-20191127.html

[IUPNation]

You've posted this several times. Can you provide the reference so all of us can get angry?

Does this suit your needs?

https://www.abc27.com/news/local/har...er%20education.

[Horror Child]

To me, that's where this discussion starts and ends. IF the state kept increasing the allocations equivalent to inflation...PASSHE would be thriving. We're 47th in funding! IF you put any of the 46 school systems above us at their 2000 funding numbers, I'd guess A LOT would struggle.

That said, no matter what statistics on ROI PASSHE puts out...I doubt the funding increases enough to help. The Integrations are what is proposed and that's the path I think they'll be pushed down to try to save this. I'd be curious how the ROI was calculated too. Like was it so high because the state contribution as a percentage is so low? Ie where if the state paid more, ROI decreased?

You've posted this several times. Can you provide the reference so all of us can get angry?

[Horror Child]

I assumed the statistics being pushed by PASSHE this week were newer than 2015. If there is a new report, I'm working on finding it.

So what you meant to say was "PASSHE released a tweet" and not the "state released a report".