PASSHE Institutions Merging

[Fightingscot82]

Having worked in Reading (I teach at the community college) for a while, I wondered how there could be two private colleges and a PSU campus there and have it all work out. I don't even think Harrisburg has that many.

The community college is thriving, it's been the best enrollment year since at least before the COVID break. Maybe there's a shift to more "practical" college education? I can't tell you how many hundreds of students we have who think they're going to be in nursing school every year.

Oh cool. I work in higher ed as well on the administrative side.

Clearly York's economy isn't what it once was. Pennsylvania is littered with big towns and small cities that once were something and much like the rest of the state have infrastructure the current population is struggling to support. Fortunately they're adjacent to Harrisburg and Lancaster, two population stable regions of the state. I do think more kids are going the community college route and to some extent the trade school route, but its hard to tell because the population of that age is decreasing so rapidly that its hard to tell if there's a higher percentage or not. The community college is public - as is the HACC campus - so that helps with some stability and long-term viability. Privates like Albright can no longer cater to the wealthier of the region and have to start competing with the upstart privates like York in the discounting game, which is kind of like a mix of car dealership pricing and the old Bed Bath & Beyond everyone gets a 40% off coupon strategy, but even then their average price is still thousands more every year than PASSHE schools like Ship and Millersville. The same goes for Penn State York, its roughly $5k a year more than those PASSHE schools to get a brand name on your diploma and not get the same education the jawns get in State College.

[cwfenn]

Albright seems to have followed the Penn West survival plan: just cut spending to balance the budget instead of fixing the revenue problem (fewer students)

https://www.spotlightpa.org/berks/20...survival-plan/

Having worked in Reading (I teach at the community college) for a while, I wondered how there could be two private colleges and a PSU campus there and have it all work out. I don't even think Harrisburg has that many.

The community college is thriving, it's been the best enrollment year since at least before the COVID break. Maybe there's a shift to more "practical" college education? I can't tell you how many hundreds of students we have who think they're going to be in nursing school every year.

[TheBigCat2192]

Albright seems to have followed the Penn West survival plan: just cut spending to balance the budget instead of fixing the revenue problem (fewer students)

https://www.spotlightpa.org/berks/20...survival-plan/

Albright says that they’re going to emphasize athletics for enrollment but last year they cut both swim teams. I suppose adding two wrestling programs and a stunt program might be cheaper than maintaining two swim teams but it strikes me as inconsistent decision making. I also expect the “cybersecurity” program probably won’t be any better than what you can get at a PASSHE school or one of the PSU branch campuses and will ultimately turn into a visa mill similar to Gannon’s computer science program since foreign students pay more.

[Ship69]

Albright seems to have followed the Penn West survival plan: just cut spending to balance the budget instead of fixing the revenue problem (fewer students)

https://www.spotlightpa.org/berks/20...survival-plan/

You can't argue with the demographics and we're definitely going to see some more colleges fall by the wayside. The PASSHE schools have seen their state aid as a percentage of income drop like a brick over the years, but the small privates are even more dependent on tuition income.

[Fightingscot82]

Albright seems to have followed the Penn West survival plan: just cut spending to balance the budget instead of fixing the revenue problem (fewer students)

https://www.spotlightpa.org/berks/20...survival-plan/

[Fightingscot82]

Tuition is going up for the first time in 7 years, but just $278 per year. Base tuition is just $8,000 a year. That's a lot of money but its the least expensive bachelor's degree in Pennsylvania.

If the state budget grants the full requested funding increase, they'll refund or credit the increase to students.

https://triblive.com/news/pennsylvan...state-funding/

[Fightingscot82]

That's not what the government says. https://water.phila.gov/drops/leaks/

LOL Thanks. And welcome back to the board after an extended absence.

[Horror Child]

DOGE cuts in the Department of Defense resulted in the elimination and reduction of ROTC programs on several PSAC campuses.

Two PSAC schools are totally losing their Army ROTC program: Clarion and Millersville, and some other D2 schools that are include Truman State, Elizabeth City State, St. Augustine's, and West Virginia State.

Some schools are having their ROTC units downgraded to "Extension Units" meaning they'll still exist but the administration will be handled by staff at another schools. These include Lock Haven, Slippery Rock, Drexel, and Dickinson. Unsure what schools these units will be extensions of.

Another classification is "Crosstown Units" where everything will be merged with neighboring schools. A hypothetical example would be Pitt and Carnegie Mellon sharing a unit since they're across the street from another. No PSAC schools affected, but one D2, Central State, will likely share with Cedarville and Wilberforce.

I'm not sure how this helps anything. A dripping faucet isn't the cause of water bill problems.

That's not what the government says. https://water.phila.gov/drops/leaks/

High water bills can be caused by small leaks from household fixtures like toilets, sinks, or hoses, or with a change in your regular water use.

[Tdobson]

Speaking of combining ROTC, I believe that I read somewhere that Carnegie Mellon and Pitt share Navy ROTC, so I would think it would be natural for them to share Army ROTC. Just my thoughts.

[boatcapt]

My understanding is that if and what size ROTC a college has is based on the needs of the service branch, the willingness to support the ROTC unit by the college and the interest from the students. If you have all three at a high level pretty good chance you'll get a unit.

[IUPNation]

Safe for now. I don't know enough to understand the methodology - Slippery Rock was downgraded to a branch program but they were one of the top programs for producing PA Guard officers. Honestly, nothing in federal or state government seems to make sense anymore if one's paid attention to the past several decades.

As fate would have it, Slippery Rock's Army ROTC unit has been merged with IUP's. How does that even make sense?

ROTC was yuuuggee at IUP in the Old Turd Reagan years. I’m guessing they no longer have their own building. It was at 11th and Maple.

[iupgroundhog]

What about IUP? Back in the day the campus looked like an Army base when they had to be in uniform.

Back then, it was one of the 2 or 3 largest ROTC programs on the East Coast. Participating in ROTC could replace H&PE requirements and ROTC promoted that to the freshmen. Then they would encourage students to continue in ROTC past freshman year.

So, rather than taking the same old H&PE stuff I had taken all through HS, I opted for ROTC as a freshman. My courses were Marksmanship and Orienteering. Those replaced the PE requirements. To replace the Health requirement, you got military history courses. They were really good. It was a lot better than regurgitating the H&PE courses, which just seemed like filler. I don't know the status of ROTC at IUP today but back then it was a big thing.

I recall that the last military history professor I had, who was a great guy, was leaving IUP after that semester to be a personal caregiver to aging 5-star general Omar Bradley. The prof was very excited and honored about it. The professors were fairly high ranking military officers on active duty. I'm not a military guy but it was pretty cool.

[iupgroundhog]

Safe for now. I don't know enough to understand the methodology - Slippery Rock was downgraded to a branch program but they were one of the top programs for producing PA Guard officers. Honestly, nothing in federal or state government seems to make sense anymore if one's paid attention to the past several decades.

As fate would have it, Slippery Rock's Army ROTC unit has been merged with IUP's. How does that even make sense?

When I saw your earlier post, my initial thought was that SRU's program would be folded into IUP's. Based on geography and the history of cooperation between the schools, it makes perfect sense. Maybe not for the football fans, though.

[Ship69]

Safe for now. I don't know enough to understand the methodology - Slippery Rock was downgraded to a branch program but they were one of the top programs for producing PA Guard officers. Honestly, nothing in federal or state government seems to make sense anymore if one's paid attention to the past several decades.

As fate would have it, Slippery Rock's Army ROTC unit has been merged with IUP's. How does that even make sense?

Shippensburg has had a very highly rated ROTC program, and with its proximity to the Army War College in Carlisle, many officers have obtained graduate degrees at Ship.

[Fightingscot82]

What about IUP? Back in the day the campus looked like an Army base when they had to be in uniform.

Safe for now. I don't know enough to understand the methodology - Slippery Rock was downgraded to a branch program but they were one of the top programs for producing PA Guard officers. Honestly, nothing in federal or state government seems to make sense anymore if one's paid attention to the past several decades.

As fate would have it, Slippery Rock's Army ROTC unit has been merged with IUP's. How does that even make sense?