Baseball Dropped (Updated)

[Monday]

Found an article discussing how some liberal arts colleges were faring during the crisis. Some doing very well at or near their enrollment goals. Furman, not so much. According to the article, Furman is at around 85% of their goal of 635 for this fall. Of course that is a huge loss of revenue, worse than I expected, but the enrollment goal seemed low. Led me to wonder if there was also a long term plan to "right size" the university. Interesting idea, a smaller student body would check a lot of the boxes rating services use, endowment per student, student aid, faculty per student, etc... It would also, most likely, raise the student body profile and make Furman more selective. A 2500 student Furman might be more financially stable and more attractive to our demographic. Being more selective could alleviate the male/female imbalance too.

Would you post the link, please

[JohnW]

Found an article discussing how some liberal arts colleges were faring during the crisis. Some doing very well at or near their enrollment goals. Furman, not so much. According to the article, Furman is at around 85% of their goal of 635 for this fall. Of course that is a huge loss of revenue, worse than I expected, but the enrollment goal seemed low. Led me to wonder if there was also a long term plan to "right size" the university. Interesting idea, a smaller student body would check a lot of the boxes rating services use, endowment per student, student aid, faculty per student, etc... It would also, most likely, raise the student body profile and make Furman more selective. A 2500 student Furman might be more financially stable and more attractive to our demographic. Being more selective could alleviate the male/female imbalance too.

Would you post the link, please

Sorry. I don't recall the publication. It was something I clicked on from a tweet. I do recall the figures were as of June 1, so recent.

[Affirm]

Found an article discussing how some liberal arts colleges were faring during the crisis. Some doing very well at or near their enrollment goals. Furman, not so much. According to the article, Furman is at around 85% of their goal of 635 for this fall. Of course that is a huge loss of revenue, worse than I expected, but the enrollment goal seemed low. Led me to wonder if there was also a long term plan to "right size" the university. Interesting idea, a smaller student body would check a lot of the boxes rating services use, endowment per student, student aid, faculty per student, etc... It would also, most likely, raise the student body profile and make Furman more selective. A 2500 student Furman might be more financially stable and more attractive to our demographic. Being more selective could alleviate the male/female imbalance too.

Would you post the link, please

Sorry. I don't recall the publication. It was something I clicked on from a tweet. I do recall the figures were as of June 1, so recent.

You wrote that it led you to "wonder". I think the scenario you described of a "right sized" 2500 student Furman would be a good idea, if it is financially feasible.
However, I wonder if the 635 goal that you mention resulted from an original goal that was adjusted sometime around February when it became evident that that having 795 was going to be unattainable due to various circumstances.
Maybe Furman will become right-sized out of necessity, and maybe that will be a blessing.
You mentioned "...would check a lot of the boxes rating services use, endowment per student, student aid, faculty per student, etc." I think one of the boxes would also be "retention rate", i.e., how many students return for years 2, and 3, and 4, and how many graduate. That retention rate should be easier to raise if the selected students do not include students who are selected "just to fill the numbers needed". Not saying that is happening, but it seems to be a possibility if you do not get enough highly qualified applicants.
(So let's just win some March Madness games in 2021, after we win a football championship and SoCon championships in several other fall sports. That will drive up the number of applicants, I believe, and make more students want to come to Furman - even if the ones who may be basically uninterested in college sports.)

[FurmAlum]

Regarding Dr. Davis's statement about the "Endowment losing $100M" at the end of March. I have many investment clients that have more money in their accounts as of market close 6/8 than they did on 12/31. Yes, they were bad at the end of March too, but guess what - the market has recovered! A lot of growth funds are up double digits for the year, while the value/dividend stocks are not as good, although they have improved a lot in the last two weeks. Most bond funds are up anywhere from 3-9% for the year.

I'm sure Furman's endowment is not 100% stock, but the accounts I'm referring to above aren't either. I have some experience with the endowment of the United Methodist Church in Tennessee. It was 66% stock and 34% fixed income when I was on our Church's endowment committee. I would think there are a lot of endowments very similar.

If Furman's investment managers are worth their salt, FU's endowment should have completely recovered from March. Does anyone know?

Using this excuse (and I know it was not the only one)for dropping the Baseball program is no longer valid (and never was).

[apaladin]

Regarding Dr. Davis's statement about the "Endowment losing $100M" at the end of March. I have many investment clients that have more money in their accounts as of market close 6/8 than they did on 12/31. Yes, they were bad at the end of March too, but guess what - the market has recovered! A lot of growth funds are up double digits for the year, while the value/dividend stocks are not as good, although they have improved a lot in the last two weeks. Most bond funds are up anywhere from 3-9% for the year.

I'm sure Furman's endowment is not 100% stock, but the accounts I'm referring to above aren't either. I have some experience with the endowment of the United Methodist Church in Tennessee. It was 66% stock and 34% fixed income when I was on our Church's endowment committee. I would think there are a lot of endowments very similar.

If Furman's investment managers are worth their salt, FU's endowment should have completely recovered from March. Does anyone know?

Using this excuse (and I know it was not the only one)for dropping the Baseball program is no longer valid (and never was).

EXACTLY.

[FurmAlum]

I work with a lot of very highly educated individuals including teachers/educators, doctors, lawyers, CEO's, CFO's etc. It never ceases to amaze me how many of these types of people make terrible, irrational investment decisions. A lot of teachers/educators don't understand basic investment and personal finance principles. Maybe this is the reason Dr. Davis made such a crazy statement about the Endowment's investment account.

But the world's worst investors in some cases are doctors. The reason - they think they know everything. Case in point. About 20 years ago a local cardiologist that I occasionally played some golf with told me he had a great investment idea and wanted my opinion about it. I said O.K. what is it? He said he was going to open a restaurant and did I think that was a good investment? I told him that was the dumbest idea that I had ever heard and that if he wanted to lose all his money that would be one of the best ways to do it!!! He said why?? I said what do you know about running a restaurant? Heck you probably can't even cook. Your expertise is fixing people's hearts. You don't know shit about how to run a restaurant and probably don't know how to hire people that do.

Needless to say he was not pleased to hear my opinion and stalked off without saying another word. And he opened his restaurant anyway. I ate there often, trying to give him as much support as I could. He had other people actually running the place and the food was not bad. After about 2 1/2 years I went to lunch there one day and found a sign on the door "closed/out of business". He lost several hundred thousand $$.

The moral to the story. Stick to what you know, and let the Investment Professionals do the investing.


P.S. This is not directed at you Fess. I bet you wouldn't do this. And as for teachers/educators, they are some of the smartest, most dedicated people I know, my wife included.

[mathprofhiker]

Found an article discussing how some liberal arts colleges were faring during the crisis. Some doing very well at or near their enrollment goals. Furman, not so much. According to the article, Furman is at around 85% of their goal of 635 for this fall. Of course that is a huge loss of revenue, worse than I expected, but the enrollment goal seemed low. Led me to wonder if there was also a long term plan to "right size" the university. Interesting idea, a smaller student body would check a lot of the boxes rating services use, endowment per student, student aid, faculty per student, etc... It would also, most likely, raise the student body profile and make Furman more selective. A 2500 student Furman might be more financially stable and more attractive to our demographic. Being more selective could alleviate the male/female imbalance too.

Would you post the link, please

This probably isn't the source JohnW was referring to, but here is a link to an article where this data is mentioned in the context of private college admissions/enrollment for next fall:

https://www.insidehighered.com/admissio ... sions-year

The bit about Furman is in the last third of the article.

[JohnW]

Found an article discussing how some liberal arts colleges were faring during the crisis. Some doing very well at or near their enrollment goals. Furman, not so much. According to the article, Furman is at around 85% of their goal of 635 for this fall. Of course that is a huge loss of revenue, worse than I expected, but the enrollment goal seemed low. Led me to wonder if there was also a long term plan to "right size" the university. Interesting idea, a smaller student body would check a lot of the boxes rating services use, endowment per student, student aid, faculty per student, etc... It would also, most likely, raise the student body profile and make Furman more selective. A 2500 student Furman might be more financially stable and more attractive to our demographic. Being more selective could alleviate the male/female imbalance too.

Would you post the link, please

This probably isn't the source JohnW was referring to, but here is a link to an article where this data is mentioned in the context of private college admissions/enrollment for next fall:

https://www.insidehighered.com/admissio ... sions-year

The bit about Furman is in the last third of the article.

That's it. The 85% must of been math in my head. If wrong I apologize.

[Roundball]

This tweet and the photo pretty much sums up how bad this looks for Furman.

[Affirm]

This tweet and the photo pretty much sums up how bad this looks for Furman.

Where was all the Greenville News coverage of Furman baseball BEFORE Furman baseball was discontinued??????????????????????????????????????!??!?????
NOWHERE.
When was the last time anything about Furman baseball was featured in Greenville News front page????????????????????????????????????????????????
NEVER.
And where was any significantly noticeable support of and any significantly noticeable interest in Furman baseball by any of the people who are now acting like Furman has done something horrible??????????????????????????????????????????????
THERE WAS NONE.

If this “looks bad for Furman” it is because some people are trying very hard to make it look a lot “more bad” than it is.
It was bad, I am not celebrating it; but it was a good, legitimate, necessary, understandable decision, a difficult decision that I totally support. I appreciate and salute those who made the decision.
I sympathize with those who were negatively impacted the most, including players, coaches, any former players whose identities may depend heavily upon Furman having baseball, and the (few) fans. Some are continuing to grieve. Grieving is necessary.
Grieving should not be seen as a sign that Furman has done anything bad. Grieving should not result in anyone (anyone who is not grieving) thinking the decision should be reversed or even second-guessed.

[Affirm]

For accuracy, I have edited and corrected June 7 and June 8 posts which mentioned Lehigh University as a peer of Furman in rankings.
I am removing Lehigh from the peer group because **** Lehigh **** actually is designated by USN&WR as a national university (ranking #50), instead of as a national liberal arts college which is what Furman, Wofford, Presbyterian, Davidson, Richmond, VMI, Bucknell, Lafayette, Colgate, Holy Cross, Army, Navy, and Air Force are. Those 13 are all of the national liberal arts colleges that play D-1 sports.
The 3 academies are deleted from the peers list for multiple reasons, so the Furman peers list based on “academics + athletics” is a total of 10 schools.
An expanded peers listed could include the other 2 private schools in SoCon, Mercer and Samford, and could include the 5 public colleges in SoCon as well, Citadel, UTC, ETSU, WCU, and UNCG; but those 7 SoCon schools are not in my list of 10 peer schools only because they are not national liberal arts colleges.
Likewise, my list of 10 peer schools does not include certain others that some people may like to consider to be Furman peers (for example Clemson, UofSC, CofC, Duke, Wake Forest, Emory, Vanderbilt, Gardner-Webb, Stetson, Winthrop, Charleston Southern, Elon, etc.). Such schools, are not in my list of peers (10, or any other “X” number) for an assortment of major legitimate reasons.
******** AGAIN going back to Furmanoid’s June 7, 2:41 PM, some additional comment. If Furman does not want to compete as a “National Liberal Arts College”, which is what Furman is presently, then WHAT DOES Furman intend to be?

Does Furman for some reason prefer to be a so-called “National University”, as Mercer and Samford are presently and as Cof C (12,500 students, 8 schools) now has a new 10-year strategic plan to transition to?

Does Furman for some reason prefer to be a “Regional University - South”, where Citadel (#2), Berry, Stetson, ASU, and (for now) CofC (#8) are in the top 8?

Does Furman for some reason prefer to be a “Regional College - South”, where High Point, LaGrange, Erskine, Catawba, Claflin, UofSC-Upstate, UofSC-Aiken, and Newberry are in the top 16?

Does Furman prefer to be “National University“ (somehow; not sure what we’d have to add, though I believe that would be very expensive for Furman) and strive to compete with #70 Clemson, #84 Elon, #147 Mercer, #153, etc.?

I believe Furman is, and should be, a “National Liberal Arts College", and that Furman should continuously strive to move up in the rankings of that group; and to move up in the rankings specifically in comparison to as many as possible of the other 9 colleges in the smaller group of "10 Furman peers" that I have suggested as the most appropriate peers due to being National Liberal Colleges and playing D-1 sports.

Again, that group off 10 peers, besides Furman (2900 students), includes the following 9: Wofford (1600), Richmond* (4000), Davidson* (1800), VMI (1700), Presbyterian (1300), Bucknell* (3700), Lafayette* (2600), Colgate* (3000), and Holy Cross* (3100).

The 6 with asterisk (*) are the schools which we are striving to catch up with (we are ranked lower than[Richmond, Davidson, Bucknell, Lafayette, Colgate, Holy Cross]); and the 3 without asterisk (*) are the ones which we are competing to continue to stay ahead of (we are ranked currently ahead of [Wofford, VMI, Presbyterian]).

The average of those enrollment numbers (average enrollment of the 10 schools) is 2570. In lowest-highest order, the enrollments are 1300, 1600, 1700, 1800, 2600, 2900, 3000, 3100, 3700, and 4000. Furman, at 2900 (as of 2020) is approximately in the middle of the enrollment numbers distribution, being approximately 1600 above the smallest and approximately 1100 below the largest.

[Furmanoid]

They (CU) had to become more selective than us to slow down growth. We’ve had to become less selective to maintain enrollment, and now maybe that isn’t working. So the obvious solution is to eliminate a sport that increased enrollment.

[Roundball]

This tweet and the photo pretty much sums up how bad this looks for Furman.

Where was all the Greenville News coverage of Furman baseball BEFORE Furman baseball was discontinued??????????????????????????????????????!??!?????
NOWHERE.
When was the last time anything about Furman baseball was featured in Greenville News front page????????????????????????????????????????????????
NEVER.
And where was any significantly noticeable support of and any significantly noticeable interest in Furman baseball by any of the people who are now acting like Furman has done something horrible??????????????????????????????????????????????
THERE WAS NONE.

If this “looks bad for Furman” it is because some people are trying very hard to make it look a lot “more bad” than it is.
It was bad, I am not celebrating it; but it was a good, legitimate, necessary, understandable decision, a difficult decision that I totally support. I appreciate and salute those who made the decision.
I sympathize with those who were negatively impacted the most, including players, coaches, any former players whose identities may depend heavily upon Furman having baseball, and the (few) fans. Some are continuing to grieve. Grieving is necessary.
Grieving should not be seen as a sign that Furman has done anything bad. Grieving should not result in anyone (anyone who is not grieving) thinking the decision should be reversed or even second-guessed.

I don’t disagree with you, but fact is, it does LOOK bad.

[Affirm]

They (CU) had to become more selective than us to slow down growth. We’ve had to become less selective to maintain enrollment, and now maybe that isn’t working. So the obvious solution is to eliminate a sport that increased enrollment.

Sarcasm noticed.
Two sports were discontinued because, even though they “increased enrollment”, those increases came a a significant NET COST; and those sports also presented major legal liabilities due to Title IX and potential future legal costs; and took resources away from needed support for other sports that offer better chances for national publicity if successful (more likely than baseball or men’s lacrosse) and other sports that evidenced lower net costs while at the same time avoiding or correcting legal liabilities.
Non-scholarship baseball and/or non-scholarship men’s lacrosse would have presumably increased enrollment but would not be acceptable at Furman for various reasons and therefore would not be a solution to “enrollment maintenance “ concerns.

[MetroMizzy]

Serious question: Does anyone know how many employees FU has? Not a set up, I'm seriously wondering how many employees a 2500 student university has?