New College of Florida (NCF), the smallest school in the State University System of Florida, this week, asked the Florida Board of Governors for nearly a half a billion dollar investment from the state over five years. The request is astronomical for the College whose current enrollment is about 550 students. The college saw its enrollment plummet by 27% and 40% of its professors left the school shortly after Gov. Ron DeSantis began a conservative take over of the liberal arts school in January by appointing six of his allies to the college's 13-member Board of Trustees.
Ask is $600k per student to implement conservative vision
Now, the college said it needs a "minimum" of $400 million over that span to achieve the goal it set forward to the Florida Legislature of becoming "a world-class classical liberal arts educational institution," according to the plan. The figure translates to a staggering capital outlay ratio of $600,000 per student for the tiny Sarasota campus.
By comparison, if FAMU had made the same time of fixed capital outlay request that NCF is making, based on $600,000 per student, it would translate to an ask of over $5.4 billion based on an enrollment of 9,000 students.
New NCF president Richard Corcoran, a former legislator and former Secretary of Education, under DeSantis, presented what he called a business plan for the College even though that plan had previously been criticized for not being financially viable, according to business experts from the University of Florida.
Any funding would still need to be approved by the Florida Legislature and the governor. If realized, the funding would be far more than the small college has received in such a short period.
NCF has seen a windfall in funding this year --- a $50 million cash infusion, including a $10 million recurring annual support and $15 million to facilitate the Governors conversation makeover. With DeSantis in this midst of his run for the GOP presidential nomination, a key question going forward will be if hundreds of millions of dollars will continue to flow in the long term amid the usual political leadership changes.
NCF drops 24 spots in latest USNWR ranking
Meanwhile, in this year's U.S. News and World Report rankings of top liberal arts colleges in the country, New College dropped 24 spots compared to the previous year to No. 100.
The college's 2023-24 incoming class of students represented a drop in academic standing compared to previous years. New students admitted to New College had, on average, worse grade point averages, SAT and ACT scores.
Board of Governors member Eric Silagy cautioned Corcoran on the falling numbers at New College during Wednesday's meeting.
"You need to be careful also of adding the students. At what cost?" Silagy said. "Because you can attract students that aren't going to have the same standards that you would, particularly at an honors college."
BOG lowers performance goals for NCF
BOG officials, this week, approved an accountability plan for New College of Florida that lowers some of its previous goals .
It lowers four-year graduation rate goals for first-time-in-college students to 50% for students who entered New College from fall 2020 through fall 2023. The previous plan — authored last year by the school’s former leaders — set a goal of 62% for students entering in 2020, rising to 67% for the class starting in 2022.
The new plan also lowers the school’s expectations for getting first-year students to return for a second year, a metric known as the retention rate. The goal for that rate moves to 75% for students entering this fall — down from 85% under the previous plan. However, it raises the goal back up to 85 percent for students starting next fall.
In another change, New College lowered its three-year graduation rate goals to 50% for transfer students entering between fall 2020 and fall 2023. Its previously approved goals were 64% for the 2020 class, increasing to 70% for the 2023 class.
Also moving downward was the six-year graduation rate goal for first-time-in-college students receiving federal Pell grants, which provide financial aid for those with lower incomes. That rate shifted to 55% for students who entered between fall 2018 and fall 2021. The previous plan set the goal at 60%, incrementally increasing to 65%.
The Board of Governors’ budget and finance committee advanced the new plan on Wednesday, the first of two days of meetings in Orlando.
BOG faculty rep raises concerns
Speaking at Wednesday’s meeting, the board’s faculty representative Amanda Phalin raised concerns over the metrics, which help determine how state universities are funded.
“Performance-based funding is a limited pool of money,” she said. “And so what goes to one school doesn’t go to another school. And I think it’s one thing to not penalize a school for not meeting a metric, but I think it’s setting a different precedent ... when the metrics have been lowered.”
She said she wanted to make sure “we’re treating all institutions across the system the same.”
Board member Silagy noted that the full board decides whether a university’s request to raise or lower metrics is acceptable.
NCF president’s salary
Corcoran, a DeSantis ally, is one of the highest paid presidents in the system earning a base salary of $700,000 (or $1,300 per student) --- or nearly $394,000 more than his predecessor. His employment contract also includes other incentives such as an $84,000 housing allowance, a $12,000 car stipend, up to $18,000 for moving expenses and $104,850 in deferred compensation.
Corcoran’s unusual employment contract, which was ratified by the full BOG on Thursday, could pay him up to $1.5 million a year.