Rethinking Campus Real Estate: Chronicle of Higher Ed on SES Alumnus
What alternative revenue sources are available for colleges and universities?
The Chronicle of Higher Education recently reported on the work of Antioch College President Tom Manley (PhD, Education, 2002) and his team as they develop a new income stream based on one of the college’s most abundant resources: land.
The Chronicle’s report examines how Antioch is planning the construction of a residential community that mixes conventional homes (including rentals and market-price units) with cohousing (in which people own homes but share other communal spaces).
The college sits on 1,300 acres: With a small student enrollment and pool of faculty and staff, there is plenty of room to attract townspeople by offering them a chance to live on a beautiful campus with access to cultural events, coursework, recreational facilities, the college’s organic farm, and much more.
“What we’re trying to do,” Manley tells the Chronicle, “is create stable, reliable sources of revenue over time, as opposed to feast-and-famine cycles of enrollment.” The Claremont Graduate University (CGU) alumnus, who took over the helm as Antioch president in March 2016, previously served in vice presidential and presidential roles at Pitzer College and Pacific Northwest College of Art.
Based in Yellow Springs, Ohio, this small liberal arts college (with just over 200 hundred students) reopened in 2011 after a three-year closure brought on by ebbing enrollment and fundraising challenges. As the Chronicle story relates, it wasn’t the first time that this has happened to Antioch—several closures have taken place since its establishment in 1850.
The special socioeconomic issues and challenges that administrators are facing at all levels—from elementary school districts to higher education institutions—is a focus of the Urban Leadership Program offered through CGU’s School of Educational Studies (SES).
For more about this program and for other alumni stories like Manley’s, visit the SES webpage.