Skip to content
ADVERTISEMENT
Sign In
  • Sections
    • News
    • Advice
    • The Review
  • Topics
    • Data
    • Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
    • Finance & Operations
    • International
    • Leadership & Governance
    • Teaching & Learning
    • Scholarship & Research
    • Student Success
    • Technology
    • Transitions
    • The Workplace
  • Magazine
    • Current Issue
    • Special Issues
    • Podcast: College Matters from The Chronicle
  • Newsletters
  • Virtual Events
  • Ask Chron
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Professional Development
    • Career Resources
    • Virtual Career Fair
  • More
  • Sections
    • News
    • Advice
    • The Review
  • Topics
    • Data
    • Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion
    • Finance & Operations
    • International
    • Leadership & Governance
    • Teaching & Learning
    • Scholarship & Research
    • Student Success
    • Technology
    • Transitions
    • The Workplace
  • Magazine
    • Current Issue
    • Special Issues
    • Podcast: College Matters from The Chronicle
  • Newsletters
  • Virtual Events
  • Ask Chron
  • Store
    • Featured Products
    • Reports
    • Data
    • Collections
    • Back Issues
  • Jobs
    • Find a Job
    • Post a Job
    • Professional Development
    • Career Resources
    • Virtual Career Fair
    Upcoming Events:
    An AI-Driven Work Force
    AI and Microcredentials
Sign In
News

A Venerable Resource for Collaborations

By Ben Gose March 26, 2017

If you think it’s hard to keep a higher-education collaboration going, imagine the challenges facing a membership organization that serves such consortiums.

Higher-education collaborations run the gamut — generally comprising five or more institutions and offering a variety of services, such as cross-registration for courses, joint health-insurance programs, and shared purchasing. Best practices can be difficult to tease out because of the variability in the way collaborations are structured: Some have just a single full-time employee or none at all, while one of the largest, the Claremont University Consortium, has a staff of 325.

To continue reading for FREE, please sign in.

Sign In

Or subscribe now to read with unlimited access for as low as $10/month.

Don’t have an account? Sign up now.

A free account provides you access to a limited number of free articles each month, plus newsletters, job postings, salary data, and exclusive store discounts.

Sign Up

If you think it’s hard to keep a higher-education collaboration going, imagine the challenges facing a membership organization that serves such consortiums.

Higher-education collaborations run the gamut — generally comprising five or more institutions and offering a variety of services, such as cross-registration for courses, joint health-insurance programs, and shared purchasing. Best practices can be difficult to tease out because of the variability in the way collaborations are structured: Some have just a single full-time employee or none at all, while one of the largest, the Claremont University Consortium, has a staff of 325.

Online idea lab icon bike
Working Together Better
More private colleges want to collaborate to share costs and administrative responsibilities. But such coordination isn’t easy.
  • How Colleges Cut Costs by Embracing Collaboration
  • 4 Consortia and Their Advice for Colleges
  • Insights and Observations About Collaboration

For nearly 50 years, the Association for Collaborative Leadership, known as ACL, has brought the leaders of these diverse collaborations together to exchange ideas. But the limited pool of potential members and the inherent instability of collaborations — which can be snuffed out or lose vibrancy as college presidents come and go — has resulted in a hand-to-mouth existence for the umbrella group. Its membership contains most of the major college-and-university collaborations, but that adds up to only about 50 consortial members.

Since its founding, in 1968, ACL has gone through three name changes and has hopscotched its home office to no fewer than eight cities. Currently it operates from the Nellco Law Library Consortium, in Albany, N.Y., but it is looking for a new home.

“The main goal is for it to be self-sustaining,” says Amanda Adolph Fore, the association’s only employee, and a part-time one at that. “We want to ensure that all of the knowledge that we’re losing as consortium directors retire gets retained in a way that it won’t get lost.”

Ms. Fore handles communications for the association, but its board members, nearly all of whom are leaders of higher-education collaborations, do most of the work. This summer, for the seventh straight year, the ACL will conduct an institute for senior higher-education leaders who are interested in creating or joining a collaboration. The association also holds a conference each fall at which consortium leaders gather to exchange ideas.

Although the diverse approaches to collaboration make generalizing difficult, some of the wisdom shared at ACL gatherings has stood the test of time.

One takeaway is that colleges should approach a collaboration like any long-term investment, and not expect an immediate payback on the set-up costs. “You’ve got to give it least five to 10 years to get it going,” says Phillip DiChiara, an ACL board member and managing director of the Boston Consortium for Higher Education.

A version of this article appeared in the March 31, 2017, issue.
Read other items in Working Together Better.
We welcome your thoughts and questions about this article. Please email the editors or submit a letter for publication.
Tags
Finance & Operations
Share
  • Twitter
  • LinkedIn
  • Facebook
  • Email
Gose_Ben.jpg
About the Author
Ben Gose
Ben Gose is freelance journalist and a regular contributor to The Chronicle of Higher Education. He was a senior editor at The Chronicle from 1994-2002.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

More News

Photo illustration showing Santa Ono seated, places small in the corner of a dark space
'Unrelentingly Sad'
Santa Ono Wanted a Presidency. He Became a Pariah.
Illustration of a rushing crowd carrying HSI letters
Seeking precedent
Funding for Hispanic-Serving Institutions Is Discriminatory and Unconstitutional, Lawsuit Argues
Photo-based illustration of scissors cutting through paper that is a photo of an idyllic liberal arts college campus on one side and money on the other
Finance
Small Colleges Are Banding Together Against a Higher Endowment Tax. This Is Why.
Pano Kanelos, founding president of the U. of Austin.
Q&A
One Year In, What Has ‘the Anti-Harvard’ University Accomplished?

From The Review

Photo- and type-based illustration depicting the acronym AAUP with the second A as the arrow of a compass and facing not north but southeast.
The Review | Essay
The Unraveling of the AAUP
By Matthew W. Finkin
Photo-based illustration of the Capitol building dome propped on a stick attached to a string, like a trap.
The Review | Opinion
Colleges Can’t Trust the Federal Government. What Now?
By Brian Rosenberg
Illustration of an unequal sign in black on a white background
The Review | Essay
What Is Replacing DEI? Racism.
By Richard Amesbury

Upcoming Events

Plain_Acuity_DurableSkills_VF.png
Why Employers Value ‘Durable’ Skills
Warwick_Leadership_Javi.png
University Transformation: a Global Leadership Perspective
  • Explore Content
    • Latest News
    • Newsletters
    • Letters
    • Free Reports and Guides
    • Professional Development
    • Virtual Events
    • Chronicle Store
    • Chronicle Intelligence
    • Jobs in Higher Education
    • Post a Job
  • Know The Chronicle
    • About Us
    • Vision, Mission, Values
    • DEI at The Chronicle
    • Write for Us
    • Work at The Chronicle
    • Our Reporting Process
    • Advertise With Us
    • Brand Studio
    • Accessibility Statement
  • Account and Access
    • Manage Your Account
    • Manage Newsletters
    • Individual Subscriptions
    • Group and Institutional Access
    • Subscription & Account FAQ
  • Get Support
    • Contact Us
    • Reprints & Permissions
    • User Agreement
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
    • California Privacy Policy
    • Do Not Sell My Personal Information
1255 23rd Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20037
© 2025 The Chronicle of Higher Education
The Chronicle of Higher Education is academe’s most trusted resource for independent journalism, career development, and forward-looking intelligence. Our readers lead, teach, learn, and innovate with insights from The Chronicle.
Follow Us
  • twitter
  • instagram
  • youtube
  • facebook
  • linkedin