Originally posted by Fightingscot82
View Post
Announcement
Collapse
No announcement yet.
PASSHE Institutions Merging
Collapse
Support The Site!
Collapse
X
-
-
Originally posted by boatcapt View Post
So if football is such a cash cow for a school, why did Cheyney cut it (and other sports as well)? For that matter, why did Mansfield cut their program?
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by boatcapt View Post
So if football is such a cash cow for a school, why did Cheyney cut it (and other sports as well)? For that matter, why did Mansfield cut their program?
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by boatcapt View Post
Same reason Cheney did.
Plus, I would say their small enrollment played a factor. If you have only a few hundred students and you go with a slate of sports teams and end up with half of your student body being there because of athletics (see Seton Hill), well, that simply does not fit the new Cheyney model.
The bottom line is that Cheyney is rehabbing their situation pretty well without intercollegiate athletics (I know they have some programs on a limited basis) and the overall future success of the institution, or salvation of it, outweighs any 'revenue' derived from enrolling football players.
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by Fightingscot82 View PostI get that academics (even business and economics faculty) are generally not businessmen nor think like them, so I don't expect them to always make the most astute business decisions. But universities also employ executive-level business managers and internal data managers. Cheyney's president is not an academic - he was an executive with Highmark. He's actually a Cal U alum too. But cutting athletics was a really short-sighted decision I've railed on before. He balanced the budget but he didn't fix the revenue shortfall that caused the budget issues. The more difficult, smarter decision would have been to create a plan to run athletics as efficiently as possible to maximize net tuition revenue. Their biggest challenge is turnover in students & coaches. There is almost no scholarship money and facilities are pretty bad, so coaches leave. Students also leave plus their target demographic is the most vulnerable to dropout. Good players transfer.
In the merger plans, both conglomerate task forces researched the possibility of cutting athletics at 2 of 3 campuses because everyone thought "Hey we're cutting millions of dollars in expenses!" But then they realized that nearly all students will transfer when you cut their program - even those within a year of graduation if they have eligibility remaining - thus making the revenue shortfall even worse.
The PASSHE schools don't have a spending problem, even though to some it appears that way. They have a revenue problem - and the revenue problem is because they have an enrollment problem. The enrollment shortfalls keep getting compared to 2010. That doesn't seem like that long ago but it was also at a significant demographic peak in high school graduates. Every PASSHE school had their highest enrollment to date in 2010. But similar to comparing life to pre-pandemic life, we have to go back to pre-peak enrollment of the late 90s and early 00s to see where everyone was relatively stable and private schools weren't using 50% coupons to lure middle class students. If the PASSHE schools could get back to their 20-25 years ago enrollment (which some say is attainable), they would be in a VERY different place financially.
- 1 like
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by Fightingscot82 View PostI'll post something internal for a particular PASSHE school. In FY 19-20, they had 90 students on the football team. Here is the financial breakdown:
Revenue
Tuition & Fees Paid: $986,335
Room & Board Paid: $637,425
TOTAL REVENUE: $1,623,760
Expenses
Personnel: $498,932
Operating: $171,573
TOTAL EXPENSES: $670,506
REVENUE LESS EXPENSES: $953,254
This is a team that had a losing record. All athletic scholarship dollars in PASSHE are "real" dollars generated by sponsorships, donations, or guarantee payments from away games.
Nearly all 90 students attended this school because of football. If football leaves, nearly all 90 students will leave and take their tuition with them. For PASSHE schools, NCAA teams hit the budget the same as D3 programs. The only expenses are operating and personnel. So if PASSHE School X cuts football, they cut $670k from the budget. But then they also lose $1.6M in revenue.
Leave a comment:
-
I get that academics (even business and economics faculty) are generally not businessmen nor think like them, so I don't expect them to always make the most astute business decisions. But universities also employ executive-level business managers and internal data managers. Cheyney's president is not an academic - he was an executive with Highmark. He's actually a Cal U alum too. But cutting athletics was a really short-sighted decision I've railed on before. He balanced the budget but he didn't fix the revenue shortfall that caused the budget issues. The more difficult, smarter decision would have been to create a plan to run athletics as efficiently as possible to maximize net tuition revenue. Their biggest challenge is turnover in students & coaches. There is almost no scholarship money and facilities are pretty bad, so coaches leave. Students also leave plus their target demographic is the most vulnerable to dropout. Good players transfer.
In the merger plans, both conglomerate task forces researched the possibility of cutting athletics at 2 of 3 campuses because everyone thought "Hey we're cutting millions of dollars in expenses!" But then they realized that nearly all students will transfer when you cut their program - even those within a year of graduation if they have eligibility remaining - thus making the revenue shortfall even worse.
The PASSHE schools don't have a spending problem, even though to some it appears that way. They have a revenue problem - and the revenue problem is because they have an enrollment problem. The enrollment shortfalls keep getting compared to 2010. That doesn't seem like that long ago but it was also at a significant demographic peak in high school graduates. Every PASSHE school had their highest enrollment to date in 2010. But similar to comparing life to pre-pandemic life, we have to go back to pre-peak enrollment of the late 90s and early 00s to see where everyone was relatively stable and private schools weren't using 50% coupons to lure middle class students. If the PASSHE schools could get back to their 20-25 years ago enrollment (which some say is attainable), they would be in a VERY different place financially.
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by boatcapt View PostHummm...A proven pathway to recovery? For some reason, the PASSHE seems unwilling to cut athletics at any of the other State Schools to help with their solvency problems. Here's a question for people in the know, have any athletic scholarships been cut at the struggling schools?
Leave a comment:
-
I'll post something internal for a particular PASSHE school. In FY 19-20, they had 90 students on the football team. Here is the financial breakdown:
Revenue
Tuition & Fees Paid: $986,335
Room & Board Paid: $637,425
TOTAL REVENUE: $1,623,760
Expenses
Personnel: $498,932
Operating: $171,573
TOTAL EXPENSES: $670,506
REVENUE LESS EXPENSES: $953,254
This is a team that had a losing record. All athletic scholarship dollars in PASSHE are "real" dollars generated by sponsorships, donations, or guarantee payments from away games.
Nearly all 90 students attended this school because of football. If football leaves, nearly all 90 students will leave and take their tuition with them. For PASSHE schools, NCAA teams hit the budget the same as D3 programs. The only expenses are operating and personnel. So if PASSHE School X cuts football, they cut $670k from the budget. But then they also lose $1.6M in revenue.
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by boatcapt View Post
So they would save even more by cutting them.
Football costs $600,000 on salaries and operations. How much tuition is 100 students at $15k a piece?Tell me where the bottom line improves.
Leave a comment:
-
Originally posted by boatcapt View PostHummm...A proven pathway to recovery? For some reason, the PASSHE seems unwilling to cut athletics at any of the other State Schools to help with their solvency problems. Here's a question for people in the know, have any athletic scholarships been cut at the struggling schools?
- 1 like
Leave a comment:
Ad3
Collapse
Leave a comment: