Leatherneck Nation

So what does or who does the Macomb merchant know that we don't know. Or does he have a "crystal ball" at his place of business where he can predict the future?

Neckfansince71 wrote: Sat Apr 07, 2018 10:20 pmSo what does or who does the Macomb merchant know that we don't know.

He is talking from his own personal observations and experiences. He owns several student rentals. He said that the market for off-campus housing is down.

Well there is no denying that! But the rest of his prediction is based on what? jc

Spring 2018 Enrollment Numbers:
http://www.wiu.edu/IRP/enrollments/2018/spring/tdse.php

The growth of the Cape Girardeau area in southeast Missouri has been a killer for Carbondale. Cape Girardeau has a decent college in SEMO, but more importantly, SEMO is sitting at number 4 as largest area employer behind Southeast Health, St. Francis Medical Center, and Procter and Gamble. If your largest employer is a public university, you have plenty of reasons to be concerned these days.

Looking at the Spring 2018 enrollment numbers (referenced above), there is a large senior class (2,695).

Western has 1,206 in this year's freshman class. The freshmen class for next year may be even smaller. Having a smaller incoming class to replace a larger graduating class will result in a net decrease in total enrollment.

SIU-Carbondale is expecting an incoming freshman class of less than 1,000: more likely in the 800-900 range. A number that small would have been unthinkable just a few years ago.

sealhall74 wrote: Sun Apr 08, 2018 8:49 am The growth of the Cape Girardeau area in southeast Missouri has been a killer for Carbondale.

SIU-Carbondale has been losing Illinois high school seniors to both SEMO and Murray State.

UW-Platteville has been taking in more Illinois students in the northwest corner of the state. Platteville is 25 miles north of Galena.

And Purdue-Northwest (Hammond, IN) has been taking Illinois students away from Governors State.

Southern Illinois University officials are considering a proposal that would reallocate state funding from Carbondale to Edwardsville to reflect enrollment changes at the two campuses.

The proposal’s initial phase would shift about $5.1 million in funding to Edwardsville for the upcoming fiscal year. The SIU Board of Trustees will consider the proposal Thursday.

The SIU-Carbondale Chancellor Carlo Montemagno said: "The reallocation could threaten the university’s financial stability. There are more factors to consider than enrollment, such as the cost of hiring faculty at a doctoral research university, and maintaining a small teacher-to-student ratio."

Since 2014, SIU-Carbondale has reduced its budget by more than $31 million and has about 500 fewer employees,” Montemagno said. “We cannot absorb any part of the additional $5.1 million reduction by further increasing tuition, by further deferring maintenance of our facilities, or by reducing staff without damaging the quality of programs and services we provide.”

Guest Editorial in today's Springfield State Journal-Register:

Investment needed to improve higher education in Illinois.
http://www.sj-r.com/opinion/20180410/gu ... n-illinois

At an Illinois Chamber event today, Governor Bruce Rauner said that he wants more effective funding for our higher education system--both community colleges and our state university system.

He said: "We need a lot of restructuring of our universities and our community colleges because we’ve got too much capacity, we’ve got a lot of redundancy, and we’ve got a lot of overlap. But we need more resources for higher education. And I’m committed to doing that."

His talk of "restructuring, too much capacity, redundancy, and overlap" signals that change and downsizing of state universities are in his plans.