Add Dartmouth to the list of crashed endowments:
Dartmouth College, the smallest school in the Ivy League, will fire 60 employees after its endowment value fell $700 million, or 18 percent, because of the global recession.
An additional 70 employees have accepted buyouts and 28 others will have their hours reduced, the college in Hanover, New Hampshire, said today in a statement. The school will increase undergraduate tuition 4.8 percent, raising the total cost of attendance to $49,974 a year, starting in September, and will expand financial aid.
Dartmouth joins Harvard University and Yale University among Ivy League schools in the northeastern U.S. that are slashing budgets after fund losses. Harvard, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, lost 22 percent, not including investments in private equity and real estate, in the four months ended Oct. 31, and said its losses for the fiscal year may be 30 percent. Yale in New Haven, Connecticut, said its endowment fell 25 percent in five months. Outlays from Dartmouth’s fund contribute 35 percent of the budget, excluding professional schools.
Maybe they will extend summer break?
Dartmouth to Cut 60 Jobs After 18% Endowment Decline [Bloomberg]
Hm…if only they had a well-connected, former-GS, former-Treasury Secretary alumnus who could write them a check with the money he saved cashing out of GS at the high before ruining the American financial system.
The only thing worse than being employed in Hanover, NH is being unemployed in Hanover, NH.
Too Lean ; No Green
As an individual of Dakota Sioux Indian descent, I am concerned. Founded as an Indian school, I hope it doesn’t affect the Native American students pertaining to financial aid.
And the school has investments with The Blackstone Group…capital calls must be drivin’ them crazy!
The Blackstone Group, it is not a rock band…it’s PE.
BlackstoneGroupie-
WTF? How many native americans are there even left in this country, let alone ones that have a prayer of getting into Dartmouth?
According to the latest stats on the student body, 2.9% of students attending Dartmouth College are American Indian.
And to be considered an American Indian, if one was to accept the standard of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, one must be of 25% descent. Other tribes have a lower threshold, but my tribe, the Sisseton-Wahpeton Dakota Sioux of Lake Traverse Indian Reservation of South Dakota has the 25% threshhold.
I am descended on my mother’s side, who is unfortunately no longer here. She passed away from cancer several years ago. :(
@5 – Indian = automatic acceptance, not the opposite.
We never did see Obama’s transcripts…
BG@7:
I’m sorry for your loss.
If the situation is not fluid then I don’t give a fuck.
Paulson’s Native American name: Legs-Like-Chicken. Only in antebellum Ivy League football could that guy play Tackle.
dartmouth student here, they aren’t touching a god damn dime of minority funding even though we’re letting the indians in to study native american studies. financial aid isn’t going anywhere but instead you’ve got tuition hikes for those whose parents could afford to send the kids to college when they got in two years ago…
Who cares? Harvard and Yale have billions in their respective endowment funds, fuck them. I hope Madoff dipped into their asses a little bit.
“because of the global recession.”
And not so much because of indiscriminate security purchase policies.
From Dartmouth’s President, as of 2/9/09:
Dear Members of the Dartmouth Community:
I want to share with you the strategic steps Dartmouth is taking to respond to the international economic crisis. As we reported in the fall, a main source of revenue – the investment return on our endowment, which accounts for about 35 percent of the operating budget – has declined along with the stock market. Philanthropy has also declined, as individuals, foundations and corporations have felt the effects of the recession.
To keep our costs in line with our reduced income in the current economic environment, Dartmouth needed to accomplish the difficult task of cutting $72 million from our $700 million budget including the professional schools over the next two fiscal years. We have reduced the $450 million College-only budget (excluding the professional schools) by $35 million in fiscal year 2010, for a cumulative total of $47 million in reductions through fiscal year 2011.
Approving these reductions, especially those affecting staff employees, has been one of the most difficult decisions of my presidency, but they are necessary to maintain Dartmouth’s strength and advance our academic mission. This past weekend, I met with the Board of Trustees to review how we will cut costs and reduce our budget, and they have endorsed our overall plan. Budget reductions at the Thayer School of Engineering and Tuck School of Business are included in this plan. Dartmouth Medical School continues to work on a new strategic plan and consequently will finalize its budgetary adjustments at a later date.
In making targeted reductions, we have been guided by our commitment to protect the excellence of our academic programs, for undergraduates as well as our graduate and professional school students. We will continue to provide support for faculty and student research and scholarship. Dartmouth is committed to providing access for the best students regardless of their financial means. We are delaying construction projects, reorganizing services, reducing activities and reorganizing responsibilities in a number of areas, and pursuing opportunities for additional efficiency and innovation. Because compensation is such a significant portion of our budget, we also needed to achieve substantial reductions there.
Last fall, to minimize layoffs, we implemented a freeze on external hires and new positions, instituting a rigorous central review of any proposed refilling of vacancies; following suggestions from employees, we initiated an incentive program for voluntary retirement and are reducing work hours where operations permit. Going forward, we also will not increase salaries and wages next year – except for adjustments for faculty promotion and tenure, a $1,000 supplement for full-time employees earning $50,000 or less and adjustments for union employees who have a contract extending until the end of June of 2010. (The Medical School will be making independent decisions on these matters and announcing them separately.) Employees electing early retirement and vacant positions created by the hiring freeze did enable us to make some reductions by eliminating positions. Nonetheless, to meet our financial challenges, we still will need to lay off 60 staff employees and 28 employees will work reduced hours as a result of operational decisions.
The deans and vice presidents agonized over identifying positions to be eliminated. It provides little comfort to know we reduced the number of layoffs through other savings. Starting today, division and department heads will be meeting with the staff members whose jobs are affected. We will be doing our best to offer personal and economic support during this difficult transition by providing a financial package that honors years of service, a subsidy for health insurance, career and other counseling services, extension of eligibility to participate in housing and childcare programs, and consideration as internal candidates for any open positions.
These plans, which are described in more detail in the accompanying letter from Provost Barry Scherr and Executive Vice President for Finance and Administration Adam Keller, were developed by Dartmouth’s senior officers in consultation with others in their areas and with the appropriate faculty and student committees. Our plans for current and future budget savings reflect the many thoughtful suggestions shared by members of the Dartmouth community. I want to thank all who participated in this process, and all who will be engaged in implementing these changes, for your professionalism and concern for Dartmouth’s long-term best interests.
We all regret the impact these reductions will have on our colleagues. I am confident, however, that with these changes Dartmouth is positioned well for the future. These steps are necessary to protect resources that provide an unparalleled educational experience, inside and outside the classroom, for all who come here to teach and learn and for the continuing employees who sustain the work of Dartmouth, both now and in the future.
Dartmouth “educates the most promising students and prepares them for a lifetime of learning and of responsible leadership, through a faculty dedicated to teaching and the creation of knowledge.” This is our mission, and it is protected and advanced by staff who care deeply about the College. Indeed, maintaining this ambition has always required the commitment of many. We will need your continued assistance, whether that is demonstrated by your initiative and creativity, your understanding of the need to reconfigure services, your patience with the need to limit compensation and defer some institutional goals, your generous contributions of time and effort as volunteers, or your faithful and increasingly critical financial support. The College has weathered challenges before and, thanks to the community that sustains it, will emerge stronger than ever. Thank you for your understanding and support.
Sincerely,
James Wright
President, Dartmouth College
Also, how they hell do you go from a 6% loss less than two months ago, to an 18% loss?
Dartmouth: still accredited? I mean, they’re no Duke…
Duke??? Any school who has to refer to themselves as the “Ivy of the South” is no Ivy. Give me a break. Duke is a Third Tier Toilet school.
So the Ivy League’s venerable edifices devolve to ruin. First, Ivies destroyed “early admit” privileges of the upper middle class; then, Ivies pandered to the middle-class free tuitions; all this progress done in order to replace lost prestige of a decadent upper and upper middle class with merit; finally, Ivy endowments’ calamitous losses debilitate efforts to honor promises of free tuition. Within 5-10 years Berkeley, UCLA, Michigan, even Illinois will supergress the Ivy ruins.
Dartmouth and Princeton are the only Ivies worth going to
for undergrad
#21 is right.
#18 is an idiot.
@1, plus the $435K severance Geithner is getting from the Fed (and the $50-$100K in unused leave and comp time). Change I could believe in….
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/02/09/AR2009020903274.html
@20, obviously didn’t go to an ivy.
i know something about you, you went to michigan THATS A PUBLIC SCHOOL.
@21, shut up you idiot
18 Duke is one of those places that’s popular all out of proportion to the quality of the education you get. Its a great place to be, not necessarily a great place to learn.
Add #25 of the idiot list.
As a Dartmouth employee watching the job cuts here has been quite painful. They are hitting those that have been here the longest. Many with excess of 20 years that are not old enough for social security and whose retirement funds have lost 1/2 their value.
As far as the Native American Studies program, they lost a long time department administrator and the postion has been cut to 1/2 time and will be shared with another program.
This has been a sad week for Dartmouth.
fYiTJt I truly appreciate this article post.Much thanks again. Keep writing.