Webster University in Missouri Faces Annual Losses of $25 Million
“faces a precarious future, one that analysts have little faith will improve any time soon”
This is a familiar story. Enrollment just isn’t what it used to be.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports:
As annual losses reach $25M, Webster University looks to pivot student focus
For nearly a decade, Webster University has seen enrollment decline by thousands of students and debt rise by the tens of millions of dollars.
The private college, located at Big Bend Boulevard and Edgar Road, faces a precarious future, one that analysts have little faith will improve any time soon, as annual losses reach $25 million.
And Webster’s bet on pivoting from being an arts-focused institution to one catering to business, technology and health sciences — leading it to take out over $60 million in bonds to construct new high-tech buildings at its main campus here — has yet to pay off.
School leaders say they have a turnaround strategy, largely focused on attracting more international and online students, that is showing signs of working.
“I have always been optimistic and positive about Webster’s mission and vision and our ability to adapt to often challenging circumstances,” Chancellor Beth Stroble said. “We are clearly doing what we need to do to ensure that optimism is rewarded with results.”
The more than century-old university is one of the St. Louis region’s most prominent; its alumni have gone on to become Tony Award nominees and esteemed musicians. Now, as Webster University has further branched into online courses, it offers degrees and certificate programs in everything from cyber security to gerontology to teaching English as a second language to piano performance.
Stroble has led Webster’s building boom over the past decade, when it opened a new $44 million health sciences building, $28 million business school building and $12 million parking garage at its main campus here.
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Comments
They have a perennially winning chess team where they recruit young foreign grandmasters to come and earn a bachelor’s degree from Webster. Wesley So came to the US that way. It’s a form of immigration I like, because these people are gifted in their “sport” at the 0.001% level.
The pivot into STEM and business was appropriate but I think the real doom here is going to come from the part about “St. Louis.”
“Last summer, Forbes graded private colleges on their financial health from the start of the pandemic based on endowments, debt and operating margins. No university in Missouri scored better than a C+…”
It’s like trying to sell students on Junior Year Abroad in Somalia.
Washington University, A+.
St. Louis is akin to deepest, darkest Africa in regards to the ever-present dangers and as to who and what is by far the most likely source of the danger. Avoidance is the best policy. Remain far, far away from the cohort committing heinous crimes at rates far out of proportion to their percentage of the populace.
Webster U is located in Webster Groves, a very liberal area West of St. Louis proper.
I’m not sure that argument makes me feel better.
It was the liberalism, and not the violence, that pushed me out of my old state.
“Stroble has led Webster’s building boom over the past decade, when it opened a new $44 million health sciences building, $28 million business school building and $12 million parking garage at its main campus here.”
Well, at least the parking garage might bring in some revenue.
It’s like trying to sell students on Junior Year Abroad in Somalia.
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unfortunately your simile is correct and would suffice for many formerly wonderful cities in this country