Seriously. And now they want to pay even more, to their lawyers... Oberlin is coming across as some kind of spoiled teen. |
+100 This is a perfect example of karma. |
I’d be very interested in a legit analysis of their applicant #s relative to similarly selective/sized midwestern institutions pre- and post-Gibson. Would be really interesting to see if and to what extent this affected them. |
All publicity is good, as memory fades it's the initial story that ossifies. Bud Light rules don't apply, the more Obie is tagged 'Woke' the better. |
Perhaps! I suspect otherwise. But since neither of us know for certain, I wish someone would do an actual analysis. |
Oberlin College comes across as being excessively obsessed with political correctness to the point of being bonkers. |
It's been leaning that way for at least 50 years. |
+1 This is nothing new. Except now they've been called out for their idiocy. High time. |
This has numbers since 2013. Total applications are up (but they’ve been up everywhere as a result of widespread use of the Common App). There was a significant dip in applications and enrollment in 2017 after the Gibson incident in 2016. Apps then started back up significantly in 2020, but I don’t know how that compares to increases in apps across the board. The acceptance rate went from a low of 26% in 2016 to 38% in 2018 and has hovered around 37% since, and yield has pretty steadily dropped from 34% in 2013 to 22% in 2022. Total enrollment has gone up since a low in 2020, but I’ve read that this is the result of Oberlin offering increased merit scholarships, including an automatic $10,000 “merit scholarship” to every student that enrolls beginning in 2021. The link has a page on financial aid, and in 2012, it says 83% of students got aid, with an average amount of 22,317, and in 2020 (the last year shown) it was 93% with an average award of $34,603. The recipient % is now presumably 100%, but the average award # is unclear. https://www.collegetuitioncompare.com/trends/oberlin-college/admission/ This article from 2019 is interesting (explaining why they were shifting 100 student slots from the Conservatory to the more profitable liberal arts program): https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2019/04/18/amid-budget-deficits-and-unfavorable-demographics-oberlin-pushes-do-more-less#:~:text=The%20college%20has%20said%20that,with%20another%2017%20in%202018. The extra revenue from more liberal arts students can’t come fast enough. Last June, the board approved a $160 million budget that included a projected $4.7 million deficit. Without making cuts, the college’s deficit could have been as high as $9 million this year, an "unsustainable" figure that would hamper Oberlin's ability to offer financial aid "and to invest in our faculty, staff and campus," college officials said in an open letter to campus. Ambar, along with Chris Canavan, Oberlin’s board chair, and Chesley Maddox-Dorsey, the vice chair, said the college last year raised enrollment. "But we’ve also had to contribute more financial aid, so the net revenue gain from improved enrollment has been modest. In other words, we are exhausting our pricing power," they wrote. |
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Interesting, and thank you. I just looked at Grinnell and Kenyon for comparison — Grinnell’s trends are opposite Oberlin’s — their acceptance rate went down significantly over those years and their yield went up. A couple of blips but overall a clear trend line.
Kenyon’s trends, though, mirror Oberlin’s a little more closely, so maybe it’s an Ohio thing or a lacks-a-billion-dollar endowment thing? |
Oberlin is definitely not alone — there are quite a few small liberal arts colleges that are looking at future demographics with great concern. It doesn’t help that Ohio population is declining slightly (definitely not growing), and they’re having to compete with colleges in booming Sunbelt states that are cheaper, in most cases. Iowa is growing slowly, albeit not at the rate of Southern states. However, less than 12% of Grinnell students are from Iowa and less than 8% of Oberlin students are from Ohio. Interestingly, Oberlin has more than twice as many students from NY (16%) as Ohio, and 61% of Oberlin students come from NY, CA, MA, OH, IL, PA, NJ, & MD, most of which are losing population or relatively flat. |
Here’s the link on Oberlin demographics: https://www.collegefactual.com/colleges/oberlin-college/student-life/diversity/chart-geographic-breakdown.html#:~:text=The%20majority%20of%20the%20Oberlin,diversity%20is%20higher%20than%20average. |
Oberlin has a billion dollar endowment. |
| Oberlin is the jokester school famous for harassing their neighbors, right? |
Found this on line. It says that Oberlin plans to spend 4.3% of the endowment on an annual basis for operating expenses. Meaning that the damages and legal expenses from the Gibson litigation are probably about the equivalent of one year’s withdrawals. Not necessarily devastating in the long run, but significant in the short run, and combined with the colleges’ deteriorating profit per pupil & recent annual deficits, not a good trend. https://vimeo.com/759634362 |