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Dive Temporary:
- Marymount California College will shut completely on the finish of August, it stated final week in an announcement coming simply days after a merger with fellow Catholic establishment Saint Leo College collapsed.
- Officers at Marymount California stated years of declining enrollment coupled with rising working prices and pandemic-induced stresses spurred the establishment’s demise.
- The college stated in an announcement it’s going to assist college students transition to different establishments for the autumn however didn’t specify the way it will accomplish that. A spokesperson didn’t reply to a request for remark Monday.
Dive Perception:
Marymount California, close to Los Angeles, tried to outlive by laying its merger plan with Saint Leo, based mostly in Florida.
The deal had been within the works for months earlier than the 2 establishments introduced it in July. Nonetheless, it fell by means of after Saint Leo’s accreditor, the Southern Affiliation of Schools and Colleges Fee on Schools, or SACSCOC, declined to log off on the association in December.
SACSCOC stated then that Saint Leo had not provided a adequate plan to show the merger would meet the accreditor’s normal requiring accountable budgeting.
Marymount California and Saint Leo stated final week that the accreditor’s refusal delivered a deadly blow to the deal and that it might be referred to as off.
Shortly after that announcement, Marymount California President Brian Marcotte stated the college was hopeful about subsequent steps.
However like different small, nonprofit faculties, Marymount California noticed the pandemic crush its funds. Specialists had predicted this contingent of establishments could be probably the most weak amid the disaster and amongst these probably to shut.
The college’s governing board debated choices that will enable it to stay operational “however finally deemed these alternate options and their related timeframes unworkable,” Marymount California stated in a Friday assertion.
“That is a particularly unhappy day for Marymount and for the legacy and traditions misplaced, each for our campus group and the native Palos Verdes space we now have referred to as residence for greater than 50 years,” Marcotte stated within the assertion. “This resolution was not made evenly. However we felt probably the most compassionate factor to do was to offer everybody time to make plans.”
Now, the college will attempt to hyperlink school and workers to “new alternatives,” it stated. It employs 140 full-time workers and enrolls 500 full-time college students, the college stated.
Marymount California was based in 1968 as a two-year Catholic junior school and adjusted to its present identify in 2013 because it expanded its campuses and its bachelor’s and graduate diploma choices.
Nonetheless, its funds have lengthy been turbulent. It was working with a $3.1 million deficit in 2020, based on its most up-to-date obtainable federal tax doc.
The Western Affiliation of Colleges and Schools Senior Faculty and College Fee in March 2016 renewed the college’s accreditation for six years. However it expressed “severe issues” and stated the establishment ought to lay the groundwork for a brand new president to deal with excellent issues, most pressingly a monetary deficit.
Subsequent month, Lucas Lamadrid turned the college’s subsequent president. He lasted lower than two years following accusations he spent college cash exorbitantly and made racist, homophobic and sexist remarks. Marcotte took over the presidency in February 2018.
The college additionally abruptly shut down a campus it operated in northern California in 2017.
Marymount California’s closure is at the very least the second amongst small personal faculties to be introduced in latest weeks. Lincoln Faculty, a predominantly Black establishment in Illinois, lately stated the pandemic and a cyberattack that muddied its enrollment projections will pressure it to shutter in Could.
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