What happened to Miami of Ohio?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Declining state funding.

In such a government environment, the only public universities that can survive and maintain a high reputation are large research universities.

Federal research funding brings them plenty of money (the schools take a cut out of research grants won by professors) and the large student population keeps the state government happy (they are educating more people on a lower budget due to fixed costs).

+1 Not coincidentally, Republicans have been in charge of the state legislature in Ohio since 1994.

Jesus Christ.

Does he not like Miami of Ohio?

If I'm honest, that's where I experienced the most drinking and premarital sex I've done in my life. The people who talk to Jesus tell me he doesn't like those things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When I was a kid it was considered a fairly prestigious public university. Not on the level of Michigan or Berkeley, but certainly better than, for instance, Ohio State, which was practically open admission back then.

Now it has dropped out of the top 100 in USNWR (it used to hover on the bubble of the top 50), its acceptance rate has climbed to over 90 percent, and its incoming student stats are in steady decline.

I'm not quite sure what happened or why. The school has a ton to offer: a gorgeous, quintessential college town; a picturesque campus that borders a lively "uptown" district of restaurants and bars; a reputation for solid academics, particularly in the business program; and a robust social scene. Yet kids don't seem to want to go there anymore. Its yield last year was 15 percent - that's terrible for a fairly large state school.

Meanwhile, Ohio State has soared in the rankings and become more selective, as have several smaller schools in Ohio, most notably Kenyon and Denison. And then you have places like JMU which offer a similar vibe to M-OH. Those schools are also doing well. But Miami is floundering. Does anyone know why?

I graduated from Miami in 1993 and so I kind of understand what you're talking about. I think "floundering" is too strong a word, but there's no denying that back in the 1980s/1990s at the peak of the initial "Public Ivies" buzz. Miami is still a very good school for undergraduate teaching and frequently ranks highly for that category, which is actually an important one. The rise in Ohio State is really about it being a research institution -- most of the "Top 20" schools are research universities and their ranking is more about their graduate schools than their fit for undergraduates.

That said, Miami did make a number of strategic changes that I think affected its perceived exclusivity (or lack thereof). Chief among them was the convoluted tuition structure that a previous president put in place in the mid-to-late 1990s that tried to make Miami look and act more like a private school with basically a higher tuition rate but generous scholarship for in-state students (budget cuts by the legislature also had an effect). Then they got rid of the School of Interdisciplinary Studies (i.e. the Western College Program -- it's now just a program in Arts and Sciences instead of an academic division) which was a major driver in the the university's selection as a "Public Ivy" in Richard Moll's book. (I don't want to rehash that debate over Public Ivies, just suffice it to say back in the 1980s and 1990s, it was an effective label that had a major impact on rankings and perception). Miami then started to do weird things with academic scholarships guaranteed for certain stats, which drew a lot of applications from qualified students but then reduced yield as those students got into more selective institutions and chose not to go. Finally, there were some scandals about the student body that were Affluenza related -- several high profile incidents involving racism, rape, and alcohol abuse. That all hurt the university's image.

But it's still a fine school with a great emphasis on undergraduate teaching

Class mate! I graduated in 1993 also.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The demand seems to be for big warm climate schools.

+1. Presumably rich preppy kids don't want to live in the isolated, cold, grey, and declining Rust Belt? It's not like you can keep it a secret how awesome the warm weather South and coasts are from sheltered Midwest kids anymore. They have snapchat, tiktok, youtube, and instagram.

For goodness sake, the South was never any kind of "secret." I grew up in suburban Chicago and did not know one kid who hadn't been to Florida at least once on vacation (most had gone many times). Granted, I didn't know anyone who had gone on vacation to Alabama or Mississippi, but then again, why the heck would they have? We knew how backwards they were.

Visiting grandma's retirement condo in Fort Myers is not the same as access to millions of first-person vlogs from attractive kids at SEC, ACC, and California schools. Kids are wiser than ever. Southern college kids are not seen as "backwards," they're attractive and soaking up the sun and distinct fun culture of their location and university. Backwards is willingly spending four years of the prime of your life in the depressing Rust Belt where you have to wear a $800 parka until April. If you're not going to live in Ohio (or Michigan or Indiana) after college, why in the hell would you go to college there?

I went to Case Western and kind-of felt the same way during undergrad. The education I received was decent but I couldn't wait to get out of Cleveland and often wondered what I was doing there.

[Anonymous]

I didn't consider school in the south because of the unreconstructed Confederates. Turns out, there are plenty of them in southern Ohio too.

[Anonymous]

In-law's are in Ohio. From what I gather, wealthy Ohio kids either go to OSU or out of state to SMU, NYU, Indiana, Clemson, Ole Miss, Auburn, Notre Dame, Vanderbilt, DePaul, Loyola, and Columbia College (all in Chicago) — including a recent governor's own daughters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In-law's are in Ohio. From what I gather, wealthy Ohio kids either go to OSU or out of state to SMU, NYU, Indiana, Clemson, Ole Miss, Auburn, Notre Dame, Vanderbilt, DePaul, Loyola, and Columbia College (all in Chicago) — including a recent governor's own daughters.

Didn’t the governor take out an insane amount (like $100k+) of money in parent plus loans for his daughter to go to Loyola?!

[Anonymous]

Maybe people just got tired of explaining “No, not THAT Miami” every time someone asks where they went to college. Lay recognition is a nice thing about going to XYZ State University or the University of XYZ.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Declining state funding.

In such a government environment, the only public universities that can survive and maintain a high reputation are large research universities.

Federal research funding brings them plenty of money (the schools take a cut out of research grants won by professors) and the large student population keeps the state government happy (they are educating more people on a lower budget due to fixed costs).

This is also something that's playing out in Virginia with UVA and W&M.

Both are private-feeling colleges compared to the large research universities like Berkeley, Michigan, etc. Both focus heavily on the liberal arts over STEM for undergraduates.

UVA has been investing towards becoming a large research-focused university and improving particularly in STEM. It's something the former president Teresa Sullivan (who was previously provost at Michigan) tried to gear UVA towards. There was controversy regarding it but it's something that UVA with its resources and backing of the state as the flagship university could achieve.

W&M is in a much more precarious position. It's a smaller school with basically no research, with a larger share of its budget coming from the state than UVA (15% vs. 6%). It's very weak in STEM other than being a college for pre-meds, but that's a role plenty of public colleges in the state can fulfill. Its endowment is far smaller.

It really doesn't make sense for the state of Virginia to spend more funding the school than others like Christopher Newport or Mary Washington from a pure numbers perspective. Why spend more money attracting top professors to educate the same number of students? It's not like the professors are brining research grants, it's entirely focused on teaching undergraduates. And it shows; the salaries of professors at W&M compared to schools ranked near it is dismal.

I see it going the route of many smaller, liberal arts-focused public colleges across the US, like Miami. Well-liked in the state and closely surrounding regions, but failing to attract the type of top students that want national name recognition because they don't plan to be stuck in the same small region of the country for their whole career. This is also happening to a lot of private SLACs outside of the top of the crop.

And of course, decreased state funding leading to greater deterioration of school resources and faculties. But that is a given.

[Anonymous]

There is an earlier thread on W& M. I don’t disagree that it is in a worse position than a generation ago. But I think it has unique attributes that could save it. First, I think the history and tradition can’t be replaced (oldest academic building in the US) and lots of kids are looking for that sweet spot size in a temperate climate. Plus, close to DC/still on the east coast corridor. And, you still need good stats to get in (much better than Miami of Ohio).

I think the Commonwealth should allow it to take more OOS kids and I think you could compete with midsize schools, either Notre Dame/Vandy/Northwestern/Tulane/BC or bigger SLACs such as Middlebury or Bowdoin. They should lean in to the teaching college/liberal arts curriculum and really focus on grad school outcomes etc.

The top 25 are really hard to be admitted to these days. Only follows that 25-50 should get the kids who get shut out of the top but are still impressive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is an earlier thread on W& M. I don’t disagree that it is in a worse position than a generation ago. But I think it has unique attributes that could save it. First, I think the history and tradition can’t be replaced (oldest academic building in the US) and lots of kids are looking for that sweet spot size in a temperate climate. Plus, close to DC/still on the east coast corridor. And, you still need good stats to get in (much better than Miami of Ohio).

I think the Commonwealth should allow it to take more OOS kids and I think you could compete with midsize schools, either Notre Dame/Vandy/Northwestern/Tulane/BC or bigger SLACs such as Middlebury or Bowdoin. They should lean in to the teaching college/liberal arts curriculum and really focus on grad school outcomes etc.

The top 25 are really hard to be admitted to these days. Only follows that 25-50 should get the kids who get shut out of the top but are still impressive.

Miami also has an impressive history. It is the oldest college west of the Ohio river, established by an Act of Congress signed by George Washington. Both Miami and W&M are similar in that they are both old, government-chartered, liberal-arts focused, private colleges that later became public after financial struggles but still attracted the wealthy due to it's size and history, as opposed to the huge publics founded based on technical/agricultural training.

The state of Virginia is not going to allow W&M to take more OOS students. If anything, pressure from parents will force it to move in the other direction, along with UVA: taking more in-state applicants. There's already talk of this. Both schools have a lower in-state/out-of-state ratio than other publics at 66% in-state, with UNC being 82%+, UT Austin being 75%+, UC's now becoming 75-90%+ after parental pressure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Declining state funding.

In such a government environment, the only public universities that can survive and maintain a high reputation are large research universities.

Federal research funding brings them plenty of money (the schools take a cut out of research grants won by professors) and the large student population keeps the state government happy (they are educating more people on a lower budget due to fixed costs).

This is also something that's playing out in Virginia with UVA and W&M.

Both are private-feeling colleges compared to the large research universities like Berkeley, Michigan, etc. Both focus heavily on the liberal arts over STEM for undergraduates.

UVA has been investing towards becoming a large research-focused university and improving particularly in STEM. It's something the former president Teresa Sullivan (who was previously provost at Michigan) tried to gear UVA towards. There was controversy regarding it but it's something that UVA with its resources and backing of the state as the flagship university could achieve.

W&M is in a much more precarious position. It's a smaller school with basically no research, with a larger share of its budget coming from the state than UVA (15% vs. 6%). It's very weak in STEM other than being a college for pre-meds, but that's a role plenty of public colleges in the state can fulfill. Its endowment is far smaller.

It really doesn't make sense for the state of Virginia to spend more funding the school than others like Christopher Newport or Mary Washington from a pure numbers perspective. Why spend more money attracting top professors to educate the same number of students? It's not like the professors are brining research grants, it's entirely focused on teaching undergraduates. And it shows; the salaries of professors at W&M compared to schools ranked near it is dismal.

I see it going the route of many smaller, liberal arts-focused public colleges across the US, like Miami. Well-liked in the state and closely surrounding regions, but failing to attract the type of top students that want national name recognition because they don't plan to be stuck in the same small region of the country for their whole career. This is also happening to a lot of private SLACs outside of the top of the crop.

And of course, decreased state funding leading to greater deterioration of school resources and faculties. But that is a given.

I think this is spot on. I was reading an article about the struggles of private LACs, and one mentioned Miami of Ohio as a public that was facing the same issues. I thought of William & Mary (to a lesser degree) as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is an earlier thread on W& M. I don’t disagree that it is in a worse position than a generation ago. But I think it has unique attributes that could save it. First, I think the history and tradition can’t be replaced (oldest academic building in the US) and lots of kids are looking for that sweet spot size in a temperate climate. Plus, close to DC/still on the east coast corridor. And, you still need good stats to get in (much better than Miami of Ohio).

I think the Commonwealth should allow it to take more OOS kids and I think you could compete with midsize schools, either Notre Dame/Vandy/Northwestern/Tulane/BC or bigger SLACs such as Middlebury or Bowdoin. They should lean in to the teaching college/liberal arts curriculum and really focus on grad school outcomes etc.

The top 25 are really hard to be admitted to these days. Only follows that 25-50 should get the kids who get shut out of the top but are still impressive.

Miami also has an impressive history. It is the oldest college west of the Ohio river, established by an Act of Congress signed by George Washington. Both Miami and W&M are similar in that they are both old, government-chartered, liberal-arts focused, private colleges that later became public after financial struggles but still attracted the wealthy due to it's size and history, as opposed to the huge publics founded based on technical/agricultural training.

The state of Virginia is not going to allow W&M to take more OOS students. If anything, pressure from parents will force it to move in the other direction, along with UVA: taking more in-state applicants. There's already talk of this. Both schools have a lower in-state/out-of-state ratio than other publics at 66% in-state, with UNC being 82%+, UT Austin being 75%+, UC's now becoming 75-90%+ after parental pressure.

I think you may be conflating Miami of Ohio with Ohio University.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Declining state funding.

In such a government environment, the only public universities that can survive and maintain a high reputation are large research universities.

Federal research funding brings them plenty of money (the schools take a cut out of research grants won by professors) and the large student population keeps the state government happy (they are educating more people on a lower budget due to fixed costs).

This is also something that's playing out in Virginia with UVA and W&M.

Both are private-feeling colleges compared to the large research universities like Berkeley, Michigan, etc. Both focus heavily on the liberal arts over STEM for undergraduates.

UVA has been investing towards becoming a large research-focused university and improving particularly in STEM. It's something the former president Teresa Sullivan (who was previously provost at Michigan) tried to gear UVA towards. There was controversy regarding it but it's something that UVA with its resources and backing of the state as the flagship university could achieve.

W&M is in a much more precarious position. It's a smaller school with basically no research, with a larger share of its budget coming from the state than UVA (15% vs. 6%). It's very weak in STEM other than being a college for pre-meds, but that's a role plenty of public colleges in the state can fulfill. Its endowment is far smaller.

It really doesn't make sense for the state of Virginia to spend more funding the school than others like Christopher Newport or Mary Washington from a pure numbers perspective. Why spend more money attracting top professors to educate the same number of students? It's not like the professors are brining research grants, it's entirely focused on teaching undergraduates. And it shows; the salaries of professors at W&M compared to schools ranked near it is dismal.

I see it going the route of many smaller, liberal arts-focused public colleges across the US, like Miami. Well-liked in the state and closely surrounding regions, but failing to attract the type of top students that want national name recognition because they don't plan to be stuck in the same small region of the country for their whole career. This is also happening to a lot of private SLACs outside of the top of the crop.

And of course, decreased state funding leading to greater deterioration of school resources and faculties. But that is a given.

I think this is spot on. I was reading an article about the struggles of private LACs, and one mentioned Miami of Ohio as a public that was facing the same issues. I thought of William & Mary (to a lesser degree) as well.

W&M is tasked with providing an intimate private-school education akin to Rice, Tufts and Notre Dame in instruction quality and size at a public school price. The numbers simply don't add up. Something has to give, and it's either instruction quality or size (which will also affect instruction quality) or by the way things are trending, both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is an earlier thread on W& M. I don’t disagree that it is in a worse position than a generation ago. But I think it has unique attributes that could save it. First, I think the history and tradition can’t be replaced (oldest academic building in the US) and lots of kids are looking for that sweet spot size in a temperate climate. Plus, close to DC/still on the east coast corridor. And, you still need good stats to get in (much better than Miami of Ohio).

I think the Commonwealth should allow it to take more OOS kids and I think you could compete with midsize schools, either Notre Dame/Vandy/Northwestern/Tulane/BC or bigger SLACs such as Middlebury or Bowdoin. They should lean in to the teaching college/liberal arts curriculum and really focus on grad school outcomes etc.

The top 25 are really hard to be admitted to these days. Only follows that 25-50 should get the kids who get shut out of the top but are still impressive.

Miami also has an impressive history. It is the oldest college west of the Ohio river, established by an Act of Congress signed by George Washington. Both Miami and W&M are similar in that they are both old, government-chartered, liberal-arts focused, private colleges that later became public after financial struggles but still attracted the wealthy due to it's size and history, as opposed to the huge publics founded based on technical/agricultural training.

The state of Virginia is not going to allow W&M to take more OOS students. If anything, pressure from parents will force it to move in the other direction, along with UVA: taking more in-state applicants. There's already talk of this. Both schools have a lower in-state/out-of-state ratio than other publics at 66% in-state, with UNC being 82%+, UT Austin being 75%+, UC's now becoming 75-90%+ after parental pressure.

I think you may be conflating Miami of Ohio with Ohio University.

No, I'm not. Both Miami and Ohio University were chartered by Acts of Congress. Ohio is indeed older though.

[Anonymous]

I think students are more brand conscious now than in the past. As silly as it seems, being a “Miami University” that is not located in Florida probably hurts them a bit, especially with kids who aren’t from the area. It's like being the "California University of Pennsylvania."