In the midst of falling enrollments and endowments, university leaders
consider partnering, merging, and even closing institutions.
Since the economic recession of 2008, colleges and universities have
looked for ways to lower costs while increasing incomes. Not all have
succeeded. Threatened closures and recent institutional mergers point to
what might be a coming trend in higher education. The long-term economic
weakness of colleges and universities means schools need to become more
strategic about how they consider previously unthinkable options. This
provocative book will be their indispensable guide to managing the
crisis.
In Consolidating Colleges and Merging Universities, James Martin and
James E. Samels bring together higher education leaders to talk about
something that few want to discuss: how institutions might cooperate
with their competitors to survive in this economic climate. Barring
that, Martin and Samels argue, some will shutter their campuses. But
closing, they emphasize, is a complex process that involves more than
just sending the students home and turning off the lights.
The first one-volume resource for presidents, trustees, provosts, chief
financial officers, and faculty leaders planning to partner, merge, or
close a college or university, the book offers specific guidelines and
action steps used successfully to create multiple forms of partnership
between higher education institutions. The book includes contributions
by twenty nationally recognized leaders in partnership and strategic
planning, as well as an appendix detailing key college and university
mergers and closures since 2000. Each chapter includes informative
responses from practitioners who answer the question, "What is the
single most important lesson you would share with a planning team
designing a partnership or merger this year?" Responding to many
daunting questions now being raised nationally about institutional
fragility and sustainability, Consolidating Colleges and Merging
Universities is an honest and practical guide to the possibilities and
pitfalls of downsizing American higher education.