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Greensboro College raises over $1 million

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Saturday, May 16, 2009

(Updated 6:48 am)

By Joe Killian
Staff Writer

Greensboro College raised more than $1 million this month, according to a letter from schools leaders to staff, with most of the money coming from its Board of Trustees.

Trustees have been under fire from students and faculty as the school’s finances have forced layoffs and pay cuts at the small private college.
According to the letter, 96 percent of the board contributed to a two-day fundraising effort last weekend, raising $1,019,465. Three gifts came from nontrustees.

The letter, signed by board Chairman Bob Stout, finance committee Chairman William Bullock and college President Craven Williams, comes nearly a month after the college announced layoffs and a 20 percent pay cut for employees.

Those changes upset a number of students, who questioned Williams in a tense campus forum shortly after they were announced.

Williams said at the time that the college lost 40 percent of its endowment in the volatile stock market last year. Williams put the losses at more than $1 million, a figure most staff and faculty said indicated an incredibly meager endowment. Williams has since declined to talk about the exact size of the endowment.

The college’s most recent nonprofit tax filings were supposed to have been filed this week after the school received an extension. They have not yet been available to students or the public. Tony Jernigan, the school’s vice president for finance, resigned earlier this month.

The faculty sent an anonymous letter to the trustees recently complaining of financial mismanagement and a lack of transparency. Anonymous letters questioning Williams’ leadership and the school’s financial health were distributed on campus almost weekly in the last weeks of the spring semester.

Some staff members said they think the school has significant problems but have been told not to speak to the media and fear reprisal if they voice their opinions.

Stout said earlier this month that he understood the concerns of staff and faculty and that the board is working to address them. The school has failed to meet projected enrollment numbers for the last few semesters, he said, which cost them in tuition revenue.

Last semester the college reported it had 1,100 students. Tuition, now at $30,688 a year, is scheduled to go up 4.5 percent in the coming next year.
In the Friday letter to staff, the school’s leaders said the $1 million fundraiser was the beginning of a plan to get the school back on track financially. The letter described one trustee’s gift as “a confidence gift.”

“We are, indeed, confident that the action plans we have prepared will accomplish the desired result,” the letter said.

Contact Joe Killian at 373-7023 or joe.killian@news-record.com

Accompanying Photos

Staff photo (News & Record)

Photo Caption: The campus of Greensboro College.

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LettuceAlone

May 16, 2009 - 3:30 pm EDT

Let's hope that this is the start of a positive upswing in the fortunes of Greensboro College.

Joelle

May 17, 2009 - 9:15 am EDT

Yes this is sounding positive, and Mr. Stout is doing all right behind the wheel. Now what part is Craven Williams playing in all this upswing, besides declining to comment? If the Trustees can raise a million dollars why can't they throw him a nice retirement party?

wolfpackgrad

May 17, 2009 - 12:29 pm EDT

Bravo Joelle, I agree with you. But I do say to the readers of this article, until GSO College rids itself of the administration they have in place, any and all funds that are coming to the college will be like placing a cottonball in the crack of a damn that is leaking in a million places. LISTEN UP Board of Trustees....Take responsibility for this college and your position there and clean house now. Your enrollment will not improve until you cut the cancer away from the body. There are four other colleges in the area, people do not have to choose you for a decent education for themselves or their children. As an Alumni, I will make it my point to encourage the many students I work with to seek other places for their academic life until the new changes come.

brokenback

May 17, 2009 - 3:42 pm EDT

What has Dr. Williams been doing? Why, he's been busy playing golf with Mr. Stout at the Country Club (another of his many benefits that should be cut from the budget) and coming up with the wording to the announcement to faculty and staff that tries to place blame for the decisions on salary cuts, layoffs, benefit reductions, etc. on other people/committees besides himself. We're supposed to feel bad that people are blaming Dr. Williams while he sits there in a million dollar home in Irving Park with a BMW in the driveway (all compliments of the students and employees of Greensboro College) while his staff tries to figure out how they're going to have enough money to pay their bills and buy their groceries? If he truly cares about GC why doesn't he do what other top executives have done and work for $1 next year and contribute the rest of his salary to the College? Heck, he should give back the money he's received from the College for the last few years while he has run the College into the ground! CEOs of any other company would've been fired long ago!

Joelle

May 18, 2009 - 3:43 am EDT

Honestly, Brokenback, Williams hasn't completely run the place into the ground as you put it.
But he's made major progress toward that goal.
Give GC a chance, Dr. Craven Williams, and leave.
I'll bet you can't find five people at that school who really want you to stay on.
Go ask the faculty.
Go ask the staff.
Go look in the mirror.
Go.

collegehill

May 17, 2009 - 7:19 pm EDT

First, we want to say that raising a million dollars from the Trustees is a great thing and show their commitment to Greensboro College. But unless major changes are made at the school they are going to have to do it again next year - or sooner.

As one of my friends that work at Greensboro College pointed out, and viewable on the College's news media archive, at the last State of the College Address in November, Craven Williams told staff they would still get 2% raises and the school would only make a 5% budget cut. The fact alone that he would give raises but still cut the budget makes little business sense. But the larger fact is that in November (when the speech was given) and in January (when the raises went into effect) the college was apparently fine. But then just two or three months later, draconian cuts were made. Budget crisis like that do not just occur overnight. So either the administration either ignored the coming financial calamity or was totally unaware of it. Neither one is good.

As for admissions, it has to have one of the best in the business to keep bringing in students to a campus costing 30k a year where the sidewalks are cracked, parking lots are in disrepair, and the dorms have not been renovated in decades. Except for that coat of paint they get every so often. The real enrollment problem is retention from the spring semester to the fall semester and over the summer. The admission's office brings them in by talking about the great people at GC - which they most certainly are - but then they arrive at the campus and see its actual state.

Finally, the Trustees should ask about all the grand projects the administration has announced and never been completed. The Sports Park is the biggest. But there is also the "Jones Student Commons" which is little more than a blocked off street, the renovation of the old YMCA, which never really got beyond the first floor; the Inn at Greensboro College (compare it to new housing at Guilford and High Point), the Theatre campaign, and the eternal campaign "Promise to Keep" which has gone on forever. And in the same speech to the school mentioned before, Craven Williams talks of a new Athletics campaign for facilities!