For Immediate Release
Contact: Tanya Tabachnikoff, Director of Media Relations, Marlboro
College, Marlboro, VT
tel. (802) 258-9263
fax (802) 257-4154
[email protected]
College President Slashes Tuition to Cater to Middle Class
Marlboro, Vermont --While most college presidents across the nation are announcing their annual tuition price hikes to increase revenue, the C.E.O. of one small college in the hills of southern Vermont is doing just the opposite.
Last week a letter written by Marlboro's young president Paul LeBlanc was posted on the college's web site: He announced an 8% decrease in tuition, allowing students to save more than $6,000 off of the price of their bachelor's degree.
The cut is just one of a dozen surprising moves made by the college's new president, Paul LeBlanc, who left a position as Vice President of Houghton Mifflin to take over the helm of the small Vermont college two and a half years ago. According to LeBlanc, the decision is part of his strategy to be aggressively entrepreneurial, a mandate he says was handed to him by the college trustees when he was hired.
Shortly after his inauguration, LeBlanc hired an award-winning architect not to design a new building, but to redesign the entire campus -- a story that was picked up by The New York Times. He then obtained $1.2 million anonymous grant to build a high-tech Graduate Center and launch two unprecedented Internet-related degrees, which have been covered by the Associated Press, the New York Times online edition, the Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition, The Boston Globe, and other publications. He then offered senior members of the undergraduate faculty a controversial retirement package which put him on the front page of The Wall Street Journal. Now he is working on starting a fully Internet-integrated magnet school.
It is not surprising that Marlboro College would take a step in the opposite direction from that taken by most other colleges in the country. Marlboro has upheld a reputation for marching to the beat of a different drummer since its inception, in 1947. The first college founded as a result of the GI Bill ; it was also the first to be built by its own students, returning veterans from World War II, many of whom had been recruited on the battlefields in Europe.
Today its 270-some students are drawn to the small college's off-beat community that is "self-governed" according to decisions made in bi- monthly "Town Meetings." (Last fall they voted to allow for co-ed dorm rooms, much to the chagrin of a number of top administrators.)
Today's students are attracted to Marlboro's intensely small classes and the mentors acquired in Oxford-style tutorials, where students take the lead and professors learn just as much. They're intrigued with the opportunity to design their own course of study called a Plan of Concentration, projects which often turn out to radically push the boundaries of any traditional delineations dividing academic disciplines.
Marlboro has indeed earned its label as a nontraditional college. And although LeBlanc is considered conservative by the majority of college's students, many have concerns about the long-term preservation of the college and what they call its "core values."
While the recent announcement to cut tuition was not shocking to members of the Marlboro Community, it was at first perplexing. With its modest endowment of under $5 million (while its top competitors have endowments over $20 million), why on earth would the president reduce earnings from its major source of funding, tuition?
Typically, this is the time of year when the college would develop next year's budget and identify another increase in tuition and fees. If Marlboro followed its usual practice, tuition and fees would be raised by 3% for 1999- 2000, an increase of $600 from this year, bringing tuition to $20,900. Instead, LeBlanc will bring tuition down to $18,800, effectively a 10 percent cut and an annual savings of $2,100 for students.
The business-minded president responds that it is actually a move to make more money in the long run, by making a Marlboro education more affordable to working families.
"We know from our conversations with students and their families that the high cost of college tuition is by far the number one issue facing families today," said LeBlanc. "I sit on the Special Commission for Higher Education Funding in Vermont and have heard testimony from students and families that confirms for me the near-crisis proportions of the problem. Marlboro, like most small liberal arts colleges, doesn't have a large endowment to use in response to the problem. We have to respond in other ways."
With the cut, students attending Marlboro will save close to $10,000 over four years, compared to what they would have otherwise paid with typical 3% annual tuition increases. Marlboro will cover the lost tuition revenue through a combination of modest increased enrollment and retention.
"With tuition skyrocketing nationwide, Marlboro and all colleges run the risk of enrolling only the minority of wealthy students who can afford the price tag," LeBlanc said. "Already over 80 percent of our student body receives financial aid. At some point, we're bound to price ourselves out of the market unless we make a stand to turn the trend around."
By reducing tuition and further developing scholarship support, Marlboro hopes to attract some of the over one hundred accepted students who ultimately cannot attend due to financial reasons. Too often Marlboro is their first choice, but their decision whether or not to enroll comes down to a few thousand dollars.
"This bold and fundamental rethinking of our costs comes at an exciting time for Marlboro," LeBlanc continued. A three year, $3 million bond- funded revitalization of the campus slated to begin this year comes right on the heels of recent initiatives such as wiring of dormitories for Internet access, the installation of a new campus-wide phone system, the completion of a new darkroom facility, the opening of the college's nationally acclaimed Graduate Center in nearby Brattleboro, Vermont, and the expansion of international programs, including a London partner campus. In addition, faculty salaries have been raised by 23 percent over the last three years.
"How can Marlboro accomplish all this and cut tuition at the same time?" asked LeBlanc. "Marlboro is financially stronger. We have stepped up our development efforts, raising more than $4.5 million last year, received much national attention, managed our resources more intelligently, and increased our revenues through new ancillary activities such as the Graduate Center programs. With the college financially stronger now than at any time in recent memory, this is the time to increase the value of our liberal arts program by lowering its overall costs," he continued.
Marlboro hopes to grow by about 30 students over the next two years, but LeBlanc hastens to point out that enrollment will go no higher than the 290s. In fact, the president is bringing a resolution to the trustees that establishes a growth cap at no more than 300 students.
Even with this small projected increase, the recent expansion of the faculty means that Marlboro will maintain a seven-to-one student-faculty ratio, among the very lowest in the country. "While tuition at our peer schools climbs above the $23,000, $24,000, and even $25,000 mark, I am proud that we can set our tuition below $19,000 and more in the reach of working families, even as we increase the value of that investment," said LeBlanc.
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Tanya Tabachnikoff
Director of Media Relations
Marlboro College
Marlboro, VT 05344
tel. (802) 258-9263
fax (802) 257-4154
[email protected]
http://www.marlboro.edu
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