Need-Blind/Star Tribune/October 18 2004

from the Macalester Public Knowledge Base

Copyright 2004 Star Tribune   Star Tribune (Minneapolis, MN) October 18, 2004, Monday, Metro Edition SECTION: NEWS; Pg. 1B

LENGTH: 1249 words

HEADLINE: College's door may narrow; Macalester College may end its policy ignoring financial need when admitting students, spurring debate over values and economics.

BYLINE: Mary Jane Smetanka; Staff Writer

BODY: At Macalester College in St. Paul, a financial squeeze is forcing faculty, students and leaders to question one of its time-honored values. If the school drops its pledge to admit students regardless of their ability to pay, will it be selling its soul to save its finances?

     Last weekend, Macalester's alumni board voted to support a recommendation to drop its longtime "need-blind" admissions policy. The school's board of trustees is expected to vote on the issue in January.

     While Macalester is the only Minnesota college left that admits students regardless of their ability to pay for their education, the idea of changing the policy is not sitting well with some on campus. The passion evoked by the proposed change was evident last week at a campus debate attended by more than 130 students and faculty members.

     "It is impossible for us to maintain that we are socially and culturally sensitive when our first response to fiscal problems takes the form of a policy that alienates working-class students," sophomore Natalia Espejo argued. "It is sad that need-blind admissions are considered by some to be an expendable luxury instead of an intrinsic part of Macalester's identity."

     But it is impossible to maintain the college's quality with the current system, others said.

     "If we let quality slip, it will undermine the rationale for access based on social justice," said Martin Gunderson, professor of philosophy and a 1964 Macalester graduate. He was among the faculty members who served on a committee that examined the issue and made the recommendations.

     Eating up earnings

     For at least 15 years, Macalester has admitted most American students without regard to whether they can pay for college and pledged to meet the full financial need of students if they enroll. As a result, 70 percent of Macalester's students receive need-based grants, a much higher proportion of students than at other elite private colleges.

     Around the nation, Smith, Oberlin and Mount Holyoke have dropped so-called need-blind admissions, as have Minnesota schools Carleton and St. Olaf. Macalester is the only school in the state that persists in those policies. The average student got almost $21,000 in financial aid toward a tuition, room and board bill of $31,944.

     Most of the proceeds from Macalester's endowment go to financial aid - $22 million this year, leaving just $2 million for other costs. Unless policies change, within two years financial aid will eat up all of the endowment's earnings, said President Brian Rosenberg.

     "Sooner or later ... it will make the college a less attractive place and fewer students will want to come here and fewer students who can afford to pay will want to come here," Rosenberg said. "This is not a sustainable long-term situation."

     Two years ago, a committee of faculty, staff, students and others began looking at the issue. The group has suggested keeping the college's commitment to making sure students have the means to pay for college.

     They want the amount Macalester spends on financial aid to remain high - proportionately higher, in fact, than almost all its peer colleges . But they say that for the first time, the college should have a set budget for financial aid.

     Most students would still be admitted regardless of ability to pay for college. But when the financial aid budget for the year was exhausted, the ability to pay would, for a small proportion of the entering class, be one of many considerations for admission.

     The change would mean that the percentage of students who were admitted regardless of ability to pay would drop from about 85 percent of entering students now to roughly 75 percent. Transfer and international students are admitted by different standards.

     Daniel Kaplan, associate professor of math and computer science, chaired the group that recommended the policy change. Macalester must tighten financial aid expenses, he said, or see quality and student interest in the school decline.

     The number of students per faculty member is creeping up, faculty pay is falling compared to peer schools, and despite a building boom in the early 1990s some facilities, particularly in the fine arts and the gym, need updating.

     "We are not going to be able to keep up unless we change," Kaplan said. "The environment is changing, and students are very sensitive to the quality that they perceive at other schools."

     While Macalester is not a poor school, the bulk of its wealth came from the family of DeWitt Wallace, cofounder of Reader's Digest magazine. The school ranks in the bottom third of its 40 peer schools in endowment per needy student, and alumni donations per needy student are at the very bottom.

     Gentrified campus?

          William Sentell, a 2002 graduate who has used a Web site to rally opposition to the proposed change, proposed at the debate that the college mount a campaign to raise $40 million to save the current policy.

     "We're not able to stomach the idea of rejecting the neediest applicants ... while gentrifying the campus to make it shinier and trendier to attract wealthier applicants," he said.

     Kaplan said given Macalester's history of fairly weak alumni giving outside of the Wallace family, he was skeptical of the $40 million goal.

     Most students at the debate expressed support for current policy, saying they treasured the campus' diversity and viewed any change as antithetical to everything Macalester stands for. Even though only about 30 students out of a class of 450 to 500 students might be affected, Espejo said, "classism is just as bad as racism."

     A few students voiced other views, saying they thought the change was reasonable when programs are endangered and faculty might leave.

     Lucie Lapovsky, the ex-president of Mercy College in New York and a specialist in the economics of higher education, said Macalester is among the "very, very few" schools that admit students without regard to finances and then make sure they can pay for college.

     "It's incredibly costly," she said. "Only the very wealthy schools have the money to support this ... I think Mac is being very honest about this."

     One of Lapovsky's daughters graduated from Macalester while the other attended Amherst. She joked that she could tell Macalester's students were more middle-class because her daughter told her that when students had a party there, students paid for their beer by the cup. At Amherst, someone bought the keg and everyone drank free.

     "Mac is very wise to look at the balance in how they use resources for students versus programs," she said. "Students need to look at the potential negative impact on their education."

     Mary Jane Smetanka is at     smetan@startribune.com.

     Macalester College facts

     Location: St. Paul

     Founded: 1874 by the Rev. Edward Duffield Neill , who also was the first chancellor of the University of Minnesota

     Named for: Charles Macalester, a Philadelphia businessman who gave the school its first gift

     Full-time enrollment: 1,847

     International students: 262

     U.S. News ranking: tied for 26th among liberal arts colleges

     Students receiving need-based financial aid: 70 percent

     2004-05 tuition, room and board: $34,156

     ACT scores: 28 to 31 on a scale of 36

     

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LOAD-DATE: November 1, 2004