What’s really going on at Colgate University? 
News Left Out of the Promotional Literature

There’s a lot that is good about Colgate University, and the administration is happy to tell you about it as they’re asking you to send money.

“The world needs the kind of people who graduate from Colgate,” says President Rebecca Chopp on the school’s website, “and we have come to know that we educate those graduates in a way unparalleled by any other institution.”

So, doesn’t it make sense to have these very smart people lend their expertise and oversight to building A Better Colgate?  There’s no downside to having alumni elect trustees – except to those threatened by the transparency and accountability that would necessarily result.

Consider:

• $46,830 a year places Colgate University among the most expensive colleges in the country – in the top five, depending on whether you include housing.  (Since students are required to Colgate-owned housing, these costs must be included.)
  
  
• The normal course load per faculty member is five classes taught over a nine-month, two-semester school year.  Colgate faculties are paid at a very competitive rate.
  
  
• It is remarkable that while the number of students at Colgate University has remained about the same since 2000, the administrative staff has grown by 44, about one employee per 12 students - increasing at a rate 25 times more quickly than the student body.  (This does not include faculty.)
  
  
• As of June 30, 2007, Colgate’s endowment fund was valued at $709 million.  Forty-two percent of alumni have donated to the Passion for the Climb campaign. In 2002, as many as 56% of alumni contributed financially to the college.
  
  
• The Case Library and the Ho Science Center were originally budgeted at $40 million each. Case Library and Information Commons came in at $60.4 million (cost over budget: $20.4 M - 51% ). Final tab on the Robert Ho Science Center is $56.3 million (cost over budget $16.3 M - 40.8%).  The 2007-08 tuition hike of 7.5% may help to cover operating expenses of these two new facilities.
  
  
• Colgate University’s core curriculum and requirements for graduation don’t include classes in writing/composition, literature, American government/history or economics. As for science and math, although Colgate’s intricate curricular design appears to require these subjects, it actually enables students to avoid courses in one or the other altogether.
  
  
• Dean of the Faculty Lyle Roelofs is pushing a new policy for hiring faculty. Traditionally, there have been three criteria for hiring at Colgate University: 1st) expertise in a primary discipline; 2nd) expertise in a sub-field discipline; 3rd) diversity. Roelofs has asked academic departments to switch consideration of the second and third criteria.  Making diversity trump subfield discipline expertise is economically inefficient, as more faculty members are required to cover all of the curriculum offerings.  Colgate’s minority faculty members number about 20 percent, with the percentage of women topping 40 percent, numbers that correspond with Colgate’s student body of 20% ethnic or racial minority and 49% female.
  
  
• Through the Hamilton Initiative, Colgate University now owns at least 30 storefronts, offices and apartment properties in the downtown commercial district at a cost of more than $13 million.  Driving out private enterprises has had the expected economic consequence of driving up prices and limiting choice.  Many small business owners have moved from Hamilton, pulling the college away from its core business: education.
  
  
• More than 55% of Colgate alumni/ae are members of a fraternity or sorority.  To date, $13 million has been spent outside the scope of Colgate’s educational mission on the take-over of the Greek houses. The Trustees have authorized $1.3M, plus 10% without approval, for “Tier I” renovations to re-named “Broad Street properties.”
  
  
• Colgate’s ranking with U.S. News & World Report as Best National Liberal Arts College fell from a high of 15 in 2005 to now 17th, tied with Hamilton and Smith colleges.

“Colgate momentum continues to build with ranking”
Colgate Univ. News, 8/19/2005

 "We commit not to mention U.S. News or similar rankings in any of our new publications…”  President Rebecca Chopp, 09/07/2007