Future of Division III

[maripp2002]

Does wrestling bring in that many tuition-paying students beyond the costs of the program?

It's one of the cheapest overall costs-wise, as wrestling does not need intense setup. It usually runs with 1-3 (paid) coaches, and for men's wrestling at least, there are 10 weight classes, that you could ideally be 3-4 guys deep in. Women's would be similar, and if you're offering that as well, you could use all the same equipment and even coaches.

So while it's not a cash cow, it should almost always, bring in far more than it costs. Depending on your overall tuition payment per student, you're looking at a decent chunk of change.

[smedindy]

Caught up with this board, finally. The financial issues are affecting smaller public schools as well if tax revenues don't meet expectations. It takes some bold management to deal with the financial issues head on, and a smart president would try to grow or start a program that other colleges have ended in the hopes of tuition dollars and fundraising.

The biggest headache is dealing with the DEI and international student issues. Colleges can't hide from them, because a few outspoken alumni can cause big trouble by going to their favored outlets.

BTW - Simon Fraser is 'exploring' departing the NCAA to rejoin their instituions in Canada. I don't think this will have an effect on D3, per se, except some SFU recruits may be ripe for picking for some D3 schools.

[WUPHF]

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!

[/quote]

The same is true at many medium and large institutions as well.

A past provost at Washington University used to introduce himself with a line about how no one knows what a provost does, then he offer a long list of job duties that included practically everything at the university other than fundraising, government affairs, endowment management and maybe a few others areas.

[Ron Boerger]

The SACSCOC has removed Guilford from accreditation probation, which the school credits to "a strong case for compliance that included a balanced and audited FY25 budget and a balanced budget through five months of FY26."  Further "{s}ince January, when the Board of Trustees brought in new leadership, the College has tightened its budget and staffing to fit the current size of the student body, reduced expenses by $12 million, and raised an unprecedented $11.3 million in unrestricted cash for the operating budget. Its "For the Good of Guilford" fundraising campaign earlier this year raised $6.02 million in six months, surpassing its $5 million goal. During the same period, the number of alumni donors doubled to more than 2,021 from 900 the previous year. The endowment is expected to exceed $84 million for fiscal year 2026, compared to $75.3 million for FY25."

[y_jack_lok]

^^^Excellent news! Thanks for sharing that.

[Kuiper]

Pacific and Willamette have signed a letter of intent to merge and create the University of the Northwest

Facing an Enrollment Cliff, Two of Oregon's Oldest Colleges May Join Forces

Two of Oregon's oldest nonprofit universities are exploring a merger, which would create the state's largest independent private university with more than 6,000 students enrolled across four separate campuses.

The presidents of Willamette University, which has its flagship campus in Salem, and Pacific University, which is based in Forest Grove, said that if approved by state and federal regulators, a process they expect could take at least two years, the two schools would be known as the University of the Northwest. The two have signed a letter of intent, which starts the clock on a cost-benefit analysis for both campuses.

Similar mergers have been announced across the country with increasing frequency over the last decade, particularly among smaller liberal arts colleges and universities. Such schools are facing the one-two punch of public skepticism over the rising price of tuition and a smaller pool of applicants given a declining birth rate that stretches back to the Great Recession of 2008.

"We are at a defining moment where we need to be thinking about doing things differently," said Jenny Coyle, the president of Pacific University since 2022. "So can we have this larger university system that can navigate change and be more fluid, with greater resources, with more people power and more brain trust?"

Both schools remain on solid financial footing, with balanced budgets, which is often not the case in such situations, Thorsett noted.

"The thing that is just different about this compared to almost any other merger going on at the moment nationally is that it is not a small failing institution or an institution that's concerned about its sustainability merging into a bigger institution," he said. "This is a merger of two equals. We believe that Oregon deserves a great private university, a university that the rest of the country can look at as a model for what could be built elsewhere."

They are currently contemplating each school having its own identity and sports teams, which is probably a relief for the NWC

Were the two campuses to join forces, Coyle and Thorsett said, they would maintain their own identities, including separate athletics programs as the schools have long been NCAA Division III rivals. Each school would have its own admissions and financial aid departments and its own set of course requirements, but would be governed by a single board of trustees overseeing both universities.

Here is the press release for the proposed merger

[Gregory Sager]

So we'd be calling these two athletics programs Northwest-Willamette (UNWW) and Northwest-Pacific (UNWP)?

[Kuiper]

So we'd be calling these two athletics programs Northwest-Willamette (UNWW) and Northwest-Pacific (UNWP)?

It's a good question. The press release describes it as creating a "collegiate university," but with separate admissions and athletics where they maintain their "characters, identities, and historic campuses."

If the merger is finalized and approved, the combined university would operate as a "collegiate university," where distinct schools and colleges maintain their character, identities, and historic campuses while unified under a shared administrative structure as a single institution.

The undergraduate colleges at Pacific, Willamette, and PNCA would continue to operate with their current names as colleges within the combined university on their historic campuses in Forest Grove, Salem and Portland and would maintain separate admissions requirements, academic programs and athletics. Existing graduate and professional programs would continue to offer students pathways toward their career goals.

That suggests they might not change the names at all for athletics purposes.  The overarching administrative structure sounds similar to the Claremont schools, which retain their separate names for admissions, rankings etc., but have different names for athletics because of the combined teams among the five undergraduate schools.  In this case, maybe the names for athletics would stay the same as they are now.  The other model would be like a state university system with a common name followed by a distinct name for the branch campus 

[Caz Bombers]

I call this the St. Joseph's model, after SJLI and SJBK in the Skyline Conference.

[Ron Boerger]

Playing with this year's NACUBO numbers - there's a lot of emphasis on total endowment sizes, but equally (and possibly more) important are the amount of endowment resources available per student.  Here are the (edit:  private) D3 schools in the top 100 of that metric, along with their overall endowment rank:

College	Endmt $/FTE	Rank	Tot $ Rank
Massachusetts Institute of Technology	$2,086,500	6	6
Pomona College	$1,810,914	9	49
Williams College	$1,708,205	10	40
Swarthmore College	$1,593,734	13	55
Grinnell College, Trustees of	$1,526,198	14	57
Bowdoin College	$1,397,968	17	59
Wellesley College	$1,272,249	18	48
Dartmouth College	$1,234,823	19	22
The Principia Corporation	$1,141,078	20	153
Berea College	$1,108,849	21	93
Washington & Lee University	$900,099	26	78
Claremont McKenna College	$898,167	27	125
Smith College	$887,854	29	60
Washington University	$797,649	31	15
Emory University	$728,129	33	17
Bryn Mawr College	$712,791	35	124
Trinity University	$703,144	37	86
Hamilton College	$665,838	42	113
Earlham College	$655,430	43	254
Carleton College	$621,782	44	122
The Johns Hopkins University	$593,965	46	14
The University of Chicago	$590,518	47	21
Berry College	$588,315	48	111
Colby College, the President and Trustees of	$508,396	51	131
Wabash College	$503,501	52	246
Whitman College	$502,543	53	178
Wesleyan University	$501,681	54	98
Haverford College	$497,188	56	191
Middlebury College	$494,120	58	94
The Colorado College	$491,168	60	151
Scripps College	$458,977	63	219
Oberlin College	$426,760	66	120
Denison University	$416,880	67	143
Macalester College	$416,127	68	161
Hollins University	$410,040	69	299
Washington College	$377,324	73	272
Trinity College	$373,311	75	167
Kenyon College	$356,836	76	203
Occidental College	$336,054	81	198
Lawrence University	$318,312	82	230
Centre College of Kentucky	$296,733	87	257
The University of the South	$295,475	88	220
Dickinson College	$286,945	89	202
Hampden-Sydney College	$280,815	91	334
University of Rochester	$276,966	92	50
Union College	$273,260	93	211
Southwestern University	$264,666	96	255
St. Olaf College	$261,722	97	177
Carnegie Mellon University+	$256,224	98	36
Bates College	$254,880	99	237
Brandeis University	$252,376	100	121

Using a somewhat aggressive 5% drawdown, the endowment of the last school on this list, Brandeis, could be expected to provide a little over $12,600 per student towards operational expenses.   For Colby, 51st overall, that number would be a little over $25,400 per student.  Berea (21st), which provides free tuition to its students?  Over $55K each.  For the majority of schools not fortunate enough to fall on this list, operating funds must come from other sources such as tuition, federal/state grants, annual fundraising, and other resources or income sources which aren't carried on the books as endowment. 

Two other things to note:  First, NACUBO doesn't care about athletics and doesn't classify schools by division, so there are likely a few schools I didn't recognize as D3 that could be on this list.  Second, not all schools participate in the survey so again there could be schools that should be here that aren't.

These numbers reflect FY24 endowments and enrollments.  The next survey, reflecting this year's values, will be released in February 2026.