Many college and university presidents want to know if their institution is at extreme financial risk. While there is no single standard for risk assessment, there are warning signals that indicate if risk is high. NACUBO, NCHEMS, studies by KPMG and Prager, along with meta-analyses by Terrence

During the past month, the country has elected a new president and the economy continues to founder. For colleges the question is how will the state of the economy shape their financial condition? The state of the economy is no mystery to anyone living through its consequences. Financial

A perfect storm is forming on the distant–or maybe not so distant–horizon with a nexus among the following factors affecting colleges and universities: A rapidly changing demography, Intensifying recruitment pressures, A burgeoning population of students poorly prepared for higher

It is my belief that workforce shortages have been creeping up on the US for the past 10 years. With our rapid emersion into economic globalization, these workforce shortages that are quickly developing will become a priority issue within the coming five years. This is not a question of having

Daily news articles are reporting that the sub-prime loan debacle will hit higher education this fall. State lenders, major national lenders like Sallie Mae, and colleges and universities are reporting that they cannot get investors to buy their sub-prime loan packages. In almost every case,

In what is now becoming an all too familiar occurrence, there have been two more on-campus shooting incidents in the recent weeks. While it is too early to determine whether these latest incidents were preventable, other on-campus tragedies have resulted in many commentators questioning whether

Price as a market clearing device is sometimes distorted in higher education because of the academe’s not-for-profit social purpose and endowment income, for instance. Colleges also often distort price when their governance structures make them slow to react to market forces, unable to

Turnarounds are cyclical events at most tuition-driven colleges as enrollments grow and provide excess income, then tail off, draining reserves from the growth period. Financial data over the past decade reflects this porpoising effect showing how colleges pop above zero net income and then

Stevens Strategy was pleased to sponsor the CIC President’s Institute January 6th Plenary Session presentation by Dr. Ann Austin, entitled “Rethinking Faculty Work: Issues and Challenges in Independent Colleges and Universities.” Dr. Austin is a highly regarded scholar who is

Having sat through literally hundreds of board meetings as a college trustee, hospital trustee and college president, I’ve lost track of the times I’ve heard that “this place needs to be run more like a business”. But in my private business experience, I’ve also