Colleges across the country are closing at a rapid rate – on average, about one a week. Some of the closures were unexpected, shocking people at institutions that enrolled new students and hired new faculty right up until the decision was made to close. We chatted with Jon Marcus, our senior higher education reporter, to learn more about how students and faculty can protect themselves.
Q: What made you decide to devote an entire episode of your College Uncovered podcast to college closures?
Jon Marcus: The number of colleges that are closing has grown so fast that it’s become a big part of what we cover on our beat. And since the College Uncovered podcast is meant to help consumers navigate the complicated process of pursuing higher education, we wanted to answer a question we increasingly hear from prospective students and their parents: How do I know if the college I pick will be around long enough for me to graduate? (The fact that this has become something people wonder speaks to the low level of confidence the public has in higher education these days.)
Q: Many of the campus closures have taken parents, students and faculty by surprise. Where can people look for clues to help them assess if a college is at risk of closure?
It may seem daunting, but there are ways to tell if a university or college is financially shaky. The U.S. Department of Education compiles financial responsibility composite scores, which are supposed to show whether an institution is at risk — though they often lag real time and are easy for colleges to game. A quicker and more effective way to check on this is to look at a private, nonprofit university’s or college’s publicly available financial documents, which are compiled by the journalism nonprofit ProPublica here. If liabilities are close to or more than assets, it’s worth asking more questions before enrolling at a school. (Public universities and colleges do occasionally close, but this is more rare and is usually preceded by a long and very public planning process.)
Q: What questions can people ask to assess the financial health of an institution?
Go ahead and ask a college or university about its financial status, but experience shows that higher education institutions haven’t always provided honest answers. Many continued up until the day they closed to say that they were doing great. People should first arm themselves with publicly available information, such as those financial documents mentioned above, then ask about any issues they reveal.
👉 Read more from Jon Marcus, one of the most experienced reporters covering higher education in the United States. You can email him at [email protected].
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 In a world focused on getting in, do you know what you’re getting into? College Uncovered, from Kirk Carapezza of GBH News and Jon Marcus of The Hechinger Report, pulls back the ivy on American higher education, exposing the problems, pitfalls and risks — and helping you navigate them. If you wonder how college really works, subscribe now. Because it’s a real education. Listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
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