First, the facts. In a nutshell, the deal calls for Goodwin, Sacred Heart University, and Paier College of Art to buy the scenic 60-acre Bridgeport campus, located on Long Island Sound, and share costs for common services like the library, security, and recreation. A local high school will build a facility there, and eventually some public colleges may also lease space.
For the immediate future, Bridgeport’s academic programs will continue to operate, but over time, they’ll either be taught out and shuttered, transferred to one of the three academic partners, or shifted to another institution altogether. (Bridgeport took the third route some 30 years ago when it sold off its law school to Quinnipiac University.)
It’s too soon to know how this will all play out. Nonetheless, I’m intrigued by several aspects of the emerging arrangement, not least of which is that I can’t even figure out what to call it. I’m not alone on that. Barbara Brittingham, head of the New England Commission of Higher Education, told me this week that she, too, doesn’t know “what noun” to use to describe it. In any case, what can we take away?
People and institutions will have to compromise on academic culture. Goodwin, where 85 percent of students are working adults and most are enrolled in career-focused programs, doesn’t offer tenure. That could create some discomfort (to say the least) for the Bridgeport professors whose programs end up there, and same for the Goodwin faculty members now. In terms of governance, Goodwin was once a for-profit but became a nonprofit in 2002, while Bridgeport has had its twists and turns, too, including a now-severed relationship with the Unification Church and a failed merger with Marlboro College, in Vermont. It may be that in the New Normal, getting comfortable with discomfort is necessary for survival.
This is happening while Bridgeport could still be saved. Goodwin’s president, Mark Scheinberg, told me that Bridgeport “was not ready to close.” The Sacred Heart president, John Petillo, said at a news conference that the arrangement was “not a salvage operation.” That said, Bridgeport had been losing enrollment, running deficits, and struggling to pay its debts. By stepping in when they did, the academic partners are able to preserve valuable programs without major disruption. That’s not as bad as it could have been. Which reminds me of advice I heard a year ago from a trustee and veteran of college mergers who urged leaders not to think of “merger” as a dirty word and not wait too long to consider one.
The partners still believe in the importance of physical campuses. Without the campus, it’s not clear to me that the deal would have gone through. For the academic partners, the campus is a valuable asset. While some programs at all of the institutions will be remote in the near term, leaders want and plan to resume more face-to-face education post Covid-19. “Students will better succeed with a human touch,” said Scheinberg, and that’s often easier in person.
Community support never hurts. This arrangement (call it a “slow dissolve” of Bridgeport as an institution?) didn’t require government approvals. But when the colleges held their joint press conference, both the mayor and the governor showed up — in the middle of a pandemic. It’s hard to know exactly how that support played out behind the scenes, but Scheinberg said the bank heavily tied to Bridgeport’s debts has been “incredibly cooperative.” I’m sure it’s happy to have a deal. For local officials, keeping a college campus that will now be known as Bridgeport University Park as an anchor for the city has got to be an important bit of good news these days that could pay dividends down the line.
Quote of the week.
“The guidelines are not only cruel, but nonsensical. They hurt just about everyone — students, the universities and colleges they might attend, and the states that will now feel a new economic pinch. And all at the worst possible time.”
— The Charlotte Observer editorial board
The Charlotte Observer editorial board, in an editorial responding to new guidance from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Student and Exchange Visitor Program that could bar enrollment of international students at colleges where academic programs have been moved online for health and safety reasons.
Which colleges are taking part in the anti-Facebook ad boycott?
After writing last week that I hadn’t heard of any colleges joining the “Stop Hate For Profit” campaign and pausing their advertising on Facebook, I heard from one institution that had: the University of Phoenix. A marketing consultancy also said about a dozen of its college clients had paused their advertising, although none with a public statement.
The campaign is keeping a running list of participants that have registered, now including DeVry University, the Lumina Foundation, Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, and the University of Maine at Farmington. Others might not be listed yet — or have opted to pause their ads without formally signing on (that’s what The Chronicle did).
The consultancy, Ruffalo Noel Levitz, also sent me its pros and cons for colleges not to participate in the boycott. On the pro side, ads could be cheaper, with a higher return on investment. But institutions should “be prepared” for a backlash, it said, “with an action plan to address comments and/or pause campaigns if things escalate.”
Prize money for colleges and organizations that support student parents.
Even before the pandemic, the nearly four million undergraduates who are also parents of children under the age of 18 faced considerable challenges. Covid-19 has only exacerbated them. Now the $1.55-million Rise Prize, sponsored by Imaginable Futures — a venture of The Omidyar Group — and the Lumina Foundation, and upped from $1 million, goes to 15 winners. Several of them (College Unbound, Edquity, and Cell-Ed) will be familiar to Chronicle readers. Of more than 300 entrants, all the winners are listed here.
Join the conversation on the “trust gap.”
As part of a big online conference next week on remote teaching — appropriately enough, it’s called “Remote” — I’ll be hosting a special panel with three college presidents on July 14, at 3:15 p.m. Eastern time, on how to maintain the trust of professors and staff members while also responding to institutions’ financial and political pressures.
With me will be Joseph I. Castro, president of California State University at Fresno; Mark B. Rosenberg, president of Florida International University; and Lori S. White, president of DePauw University, and I can’t wait to hear their insights on this crucial topic. For more on the session and the entire two-day free event, see here.
Got a tip you’d like to share or a question you’d like me to answer? Let me know, at goldie@chronicle.com. If you have been forwarded this newsletter and would like to see past issues, or sign up to receive your own copy, you can do so here. If you want to follow me on Twitter, @GoldieStandard is my handle.