Future of Division III

[WUPHF]

I've been assiduously studying women's flag football games on YouTube in preparation for North Park's WFF debut this spring, trying to learn the lingo and see how the sport-specific rules shake out in actual game play so that I can call the games without stumbling around and looking like a tyro.

What I've mostly learned is that the Mexicans are really, really good at women's flag football, and Diana Flores is the Tom Brady of this sport.

I just assumed that flag football was mostly driven by the American suburbs, but that is interesting.

Mexico has a surprisingly long and proud history of men's college football, but I really had no idea that they were so dominant in flag football.

Apparently, flag football is also coming to the Olympics or maybe has already been an Olympic sport.

I love that North Park has a Norwegian on the squad.

Yes, Aurora Drangevag is NPU flag football's version of what I call the "Random Scandinavian Factor" of North Park athletics. Seemingly every sport on campus that doesn't involve bats and gloves has to have at least one Norwegian or Swede on the roster, regardless of whether or not the sport is popular in Scandinavia -- and at one point a few years ago we did indeed have a Swedish baseball player.

Because Aurora's high school was named after Edvard Grieg, I'm hoping to talk NPU's flag football head coach Ramon Palma into having the Vikings run out onto the field before games with "In the Hall of the Mountain King" blaring over the P.A.

That is awesome!

[Gregory Sager]

I've been assiduously studying women's flag football games on YouTube in preparation for North Park's WFF debut this spring, trying to learn the lingo and see how the sport-specific rules shake out in actual game play so that I can call the games without stumbling around and looking like a tyro.

What I've mostly learned is that the Mexicans are really, really good at women's flag football, and Diana Flores is the Tom Brady of this sport.

I just assumed that flag football was mostly driven by the American suburbs, but that is interesting.

Mexico has a surprisingly long and proud history of men's college football, but I really had no idea that they were so dominant in flag football.

Apparently, flag football is also coming to the Olympics or maybe has already been an Olympic sport.

I love that North Park has a Norwegian on the squad.

Yes, Aurora Drangevag is NPU flag football's version of what I call the "Random Scandinavian Factor" of North Park athletics. Seemingly every sport on campus that doesn't involve bats and gloves has to have at least one Norwegian or Swede on the roster, regardless of whether or not the sport is popular in Scandinavia -- and at one point a few years ago we did indeed have a Swedish baseball player.

Because Aurora's high school was named after Edvard Grieg, I'm hoping to talk NPU's flag football head coach Ramon Palma into having the Vikings run out onto the field before games with "In the Hall of the Mountain King" blaring over the P.A.

What about team handball?

Alas, it's only a club sport for now. No American college or university has a team handball varsity program.

[Kuiper]

Calvin to eliminate 12.5% of faculty positions and eliminate multiple programs

Calvin University will reduce 12.5% of its faculty positions over the next two years, part of a restructuring that also includes the loss or consolidation of multiple academic programs.

Among the programs impacted are several language majors and minors, the journalism minor and the public health major and minor.

Among the biggest changes is the 12.5% overall decrease in faculty positions, which was described as a combination of recommendations by multiple university task forces at work since the 2024-25 school year.

According to Calvin, most of the departures are voluntary and many were identified during budget planning that occurred last year.

Involuntary departures will amount to around 3% of the current full-time faculty workforce. Those impacted have been notified.

The other big change is a reduction of programs, including undergraduate majors and minors and graduate programs.

The following undergraduate programs will be discontinued entirely:

    The French major and minor
    The German minor
    The journalism minor
    The public health major and minor
    The sociology major
    The therapeutic recreation major

In addition, Elzinga wrote that majors and concentrations in the university's Department of Geology, Geography and Environment will be consolidated from nine separate degrees into two majors with two concentrations apiece.

Other departments are revising offerings and workloads, or relocating, like the science education studies program moving into the School of Education.

Also included in Elzinga's communication were four graduate programs slated to be discontinued after a decision during the 2024-25 school year, including the data science, nursing, public administration and public health programs.

Zimmerman said the phase out will happen over time, with initial impacts beginning during the 2026-27 academic year.

[Ralph Turner]

D3playbook.com featured an ABC story about St Francis U (Loretto, PA) moving from D1 in Northeast Conference to D3.
They sponsor 9 men's sports including football and men's volleyball but no baseball and 12 women's sports including field hockey, lacrosse and water polo.

With the success that Hartford, Birmingham-Southern and Centenary have had moving over (not down) to D-3, where might they fit?  (If B-SC had administration as capable as their athletic department and programs, they would still be open, IMHO.) Centenary has been able to keep its doors open another decade since its move to D-3, with reasonable success in the conference dominated by Trinity for most of the time.

[Berewyn]

St. Francis will be joining the Presidents' Athletic Conference:

https://pacathletics.org/news/2025/3/25/general-saint-francis-university-to-reclassify-to-ncaa-division-iii-join-presidents-athletic-conference.aspx

[ziggy]

Calvin to eliminate 12.5% of faculty positions and eliminate multiple programs

Calvin University will reduce 12.5% of its faculty positions over the next two years, part of a restructuring that also includes the loss or consolidation of multiple academic programs.

Among the programs impacted are several language majors and minors, the journalism minor and the public health major and minor.

Would be interested in a Ron Boerger institutional evaluation of Calvin because I'm not sure this is so much #badnews as it is adjusting and reorganizing based on choices students are making for their fields of study.

As a mid-aughts engineering student at Calvin I had the choice of four concentrations. Today that number is seven, plus an additional biomedical engineering minor that was not available when I was there. So while it's never great to see departments or programs consolidated or eliminated, there have been departments and programs that have expanded over the last two decades.

Edit: also wanted to add that Calvin is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year and as part of that celebration they are hosting something like 30 alumni gatherings around the country. I had the opportunity to attend one of these this fall and I was a little surprised how little if felt like a veiled fundraising barnstorming tour. It felt very much like a face value engagement to connect with alumni and talk about Calvin's past, present and future without a sales pitch for financial support. More to the point, while there was a nominal fee as part of the registration for the event it couldn't possibly have covered the cost of the venue and food.

[Ralph Turner]

You describe the "nominal fee" as a more intentional "RSVP" to the event.

[Ron Boerger]

Would be interested in a Ron Boerger institutional evaluation of Calvin because I'm not sure this is so much #badnews as it is adjusting and reorganizing based on choices students are making for their fields of study.

At first gasp (two deep into some pretty serious margaritas at lunch, yay retirement) Calvin looks to be in decent shape, but 2024 was not a good year with losses of $13M on intake of $185M.  The university showed substantial net income in each of the ten years prior.  Calvin sees sizeable income from contributions each year, in the $30-50M range per school year, which for a college its size is way above average.  2024 contributions were at the lower end of that range.

Net assets have increased over the last five years by over $100M to nearly $500M so Calvin is doing better than many of its peers.

[ziggy]

You describe the "nominal fee" as a more intentional "RSVP" to the event.

Yes, this is how I thought of it as well. There is no way the $10 for me, the $10 for my wife and from every other attendee was designed for the event to even be break-even. All the more to the point that they weren't trying to gather people so they could hold their hands out or pass a basket.

[WUPHF]

Edit: also wanted to add that Calvin is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year and as part of that celebration they are hosting something like 30 alumni gatherings around the country. I had the opportunity to attend one of these this fall and I was a little surprised how little if felt like a veiled fundraising barnstorming tour. It felt very much like a face value engagement to connect with alumni and talk about Calvin's past, present and future without a sales pitch for financial support. More to the point, while there was a nominal fee as part of the registration for the event it couldn't possibly have covered the cost of the venue and food.

This is how most colleges and universities are doing fundraising in 2025 in my limited experience.

[Ron Boerger]

Surprising they'd charge anything, tbh.  It might be a way to boost their alumni giving percentages.

[Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan)]

Edit: also wanted to add that Calvin is celebrating its 150th anniversary this year and as part of that celebration they are hosting something like 30 alumni gatherings around the country. I had the opportunity to attend one of these this fall and I was a little surprised how little if felt like a veiled fundraising barnstorming tour. It felt very much like a face value engagement to connect with alumni and talk about Calvin's past, present and future without a sales pitch for financial support. More to the point, while there was a nominal fee as part of the registration for the event it couldn't possibly have covered the cost of the venue and food.

This is how most colleges and universities are doing fundraising in 2025 in my limited experience.

Yeah, this is college fundraising 101 these days.  The registration fee is to weed out people who are unlikely to give (and also have a better sense of numbers for the event, to not be entirely cynical).  There's also some thought that getting alums who live near each other, but might not otherwise know each other, will foster some nostalgia that also enhances likelihood to give.

The job of college President these days is almost 100% fundraising - they hire specialists to do the academic and organizational stuff - not a world that seems super exciting to me!  One of the many things that has softened the blow of my alma mater closing.

[y_jack_lok]

^^^ That all works in places where there is a concentration of alumni who can gather. But there are no other, to my knowledge, alums of my alma mater living anywhere near me. However, last June I received a call from the VP for Advancement. She knew I always make my gift in June and expressed the hope I would do so again. So it was clearly a fundraising call, but we also had a very nice general conversation. It's the first time that has happened in the many decades since I graduated. Sure, I've been called during phone-a-thons, but always by a student or other alum. The call from the VP worked. I wasn't asked to increase my gift, but I did.

[Gregory Sager]

The job of college President these days is almost 100% fundraising - they hire specialists to do the academic and organizational stuff - not a world that seems super exciting to me!

Yes, this is very much how I've viewed the job of small-private-school president for quite awhile. For instance, North Park's current president is a former Big Ten basketball player who served as NPU's assistant women's basketball coach a couple of decades ago while also working within the school's administration, and thus she's naturally a big supporter of Vikings sports -- but when I see her at a game, honestly, part of me is thinking, "What, no rubber-chicken-circuit dinner in Omaha or Youngstown or Minneapolis today?"

I suspect that she picks up more frequent-flier miles than a travel blogger.

I have a friend who works at another D3 school who said to me a few years ago, "If I see our president on campus, my first thought is that there must be some kind of crisis here that's keeping him away from his job of glad-handing alumni into donating to the school."