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In a context characterized by public spending reviews and research funding shortages, governments in several countries are putting pressure on universities to increase their applied research activity, intensify their interaction with industry, and attract funding from the nonacademic domain. The economic literature provides rich evidence on the convergence between institutional factors and individual-level characteristics that are influencing university involvement in knowledge transfer activities. The aim of this article is to investigate the impact of universities' regulation of knowledge transfer activities on the institutional capability to raise funding from research contracts and consultancies. Based on extensive department-level data on university funding, we address the characteristics of institutional knowledge transfer practices and investigate how these activities influence the intensity of funding to Italian universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We build a model of universities combining their real production decisions with their choice of endowment size and asset allocation. Variation in opportunity cost, that is, the productivity of internal projects, has a first-order effect on these choices. Adding the UPMIFA-mandated 7% payout constraint, the endowment size and asset allocations match those empirically observed. This constraint has little effect on universities that do not value the output of their internal projects but harms those that do: it prevents the endowment's use as an effective buffer stock, thereby increasing the volatility of production, and it slows the growth of the most productive universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Creating world-class universities (WCUs) has recently become a significant policy and practice in higher education in China under the Double World-Class Project. However, some negative effects have encouraged decoupling from the policy goals. To identify the reasons, we conducted policy document analysis and purposive interviews at three elite universities, focusing on financial funding, discipline development, and human resources. First, the uneven funding plans by central and local governments shape non-competitive environments for universities, hindering the dynamic adjustment of the Double World-Class Project. Second, universities have closed or merged programs in weak academic disciplines to gain legitimacy and stability in conformance to WCU guidelines. Last, as a result of the unbalanced development of universities in east, middle, and west China, universities in the west are facing a serious brain drain. To achieve a higher level of performance, an increasing number of 'shadow academics' are being recruited by Chinese universities. These decoupling responses and manipulative strategies result from the dominating constituent in WCUs, ambiguity in policy contents, hierarchical control systems in higher education, and uncertain environments for universities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most universities (bar profit-making institutions) are charities as a matter of law but, historically, have been exempt from charity law regulation. This paper considers the statutory reforms of 2006, which sought to level the regulatory playing field by appointing 'Principal Regulators' of such 'exempt charities' to promote compliance with charity law. Focusing on the university sector – where some universities are now registered charities (and regulated by the Charity Commission) whilst others remain exempt – it will note how the reforms have resulted in the application of significantly different degrees of scrutiny and accountability, both between individual universities and between universities and other charities. In part, this is due to the statutory framework itself but, significantly, is also attributable to the radically different approach taken by the Office for Students, which replaced HEFCE as Principal Regulator in 2018. Possible improvements in regulatory practice and statutory reform are offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the allocation of university administrative costs in a responsibility-centered management (RCM) model by citing the experiences of Regional State University (RSU) in the U.S. Also cited are how to align academic college budgets with revenues, and the revenue ratios of the RSU colleges like the College of Arts and Humanities.

The article presents the discussion on disputed transactions innovatively mitigated the university's funding crisis executing the Real Estate Deals for supplementing state funding and other educational, religious, and charitable institutions.

The article discusses the history and growing use of donor-advised funds (DAF) in higher education philanthropy, particularly in the U.S. Also cited are some DAFs like Fidelity Charitable, how DAFs serve as intermediaries between charitable organizations and donors, how DAFs are boosted by the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA), and the role of DAFs in philanthropy.

In many cases, athletics department spending has been spurred by a desire to field more competitive athletics programs, and it has been assumed that spending more would result in greater on-the-field success for the athletics program. However, little empirical evidence exists to support this assumption, and few studies have explored financials trends related to cost-benefit of intercollegiate athletics program. Thus, the aim of this study was to determine the relationship between on-the-field success and spending while also exploring current trends. The authors drew longitudinal data from EADA reports and then examined the association with Directors' Cup rankings at the end of these respective seasons. The results indicated that a relationship between overall expenses and on-the-field success does exist, and points to operating expenses, rather than coaching salaries and recruiting expenses, as having greatest influence on this relationship. The cost-benefit analysis and trends over time are also explored and discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses various papers published within the issue, including one on the financial inequalities faced by historically black colleges and universities (HBCU), another on the effects of financial inequalities on student athletes and a paper on the relationship between athletic department spending and on-the-field success.

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Higher education Institutions in the 21st century face grand global challenges, while at the same time many stakeholders have increasing expectations of universities. In Europe universities have been equally facing a complex financial situation in which conventional models of funding have been transformed and continue to evolve. This paper addresses some of the trends observed in the last decade connected to university funding and governance in relation to these global challenges and what kind of reforms are needed at system and institutional level to address them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the history of postseason payouts for the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s (NCAA) Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS). The authors discuss the history of the bowl system for both Bowl Championship Series (BCS) and non-BCS charter institutions, analyze the payouts made to both types of schools between 1902 and 2010, and explore the financial impact of corporate sponsorship in college football. They provide information on several bowl tournaments, including the Rose Bowl, the Orange Bowl, and the Fiesta Bowl.

U.S. academic libraries have substantial resources to commit to advance the research and teaching and learning agendas of their institutions. In the aggregate, academic libraries annually have $2,000,000,000 in purchasing power for materials. However, the disproportionate increases in the costs of scholarly information continue to erode the ability of libraries to meet the information needs of their users. If academic libraries consolidated their purchasing power and pooled their resources, the results for higher education could be transformational. Effectively, a universal digital academic library could be established to serve higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Librarians, publishers, and vendors have all experienced a period of assessment, strategic review, and reaction as a result of not only the recent economic downturn but also the continued evolution from an industry that was primarily print-based to one dominated by electronic dissemination of scholarly information. This article addresses some of the important actions taken by vendors, publishers, and librarians as a result of the recent economic situation and the continued migration of scholarly resources to electronic formats. It explores patterns in publisher prices and pricing models, library content selection, and spending trends, as well as vendor strategies and tactics during a time of fiscal challenge and industry change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on the need for continual organizational change and new thinking about the work that libraries, librarians, and staff must do to remain key players in the academic world of the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study introduces and explores the value of SPLIT donors (donors making gifts to both academic and athletic programs at educational institutions). Detailed empirical records of donor giving to three NCAA Division I institutions establish that significant value of SPLIT donors to educational institutions. In the short term, SPLIT donors give higher total average gifts than donors making athletics-only gifts. In the long-term, SPLIT donors are retained at a higher rate than donors making academics-only gifts. The combination of gift size and retention rate maximizes the lifetime value of SPLIT donors to the institution. However, despite having higher lifetime value to the institution, there may be a disincentive for athletic programs to cultivate SPLIT donors. While the average total gifts of SPLIT donors are higher than the average gifts of their counterparts supporting only athletic programs, their average gift to athletics is lower. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are A-Changin'" describes the situation facing most college and university leaders as a result of the recent economic downturn. All financial commitments are under review, if not attack. Strong, executive leadership has always been needed in campus recreation, and the field has been well served by great leaders throughout time. That said, there are new challenges to address, due in large part to economic realities. Leadership theorists of the day call for a new type of leadership, one that is also well suited to the campus recreation area. This article tracks the latest developments in leadership and encourages directors to adopt (or reaffirm) four leadership practices that will help them lead their programs more effectively in addition to positioning the programs for ongoing support during these challenging economic times. As Bill George (2009, p. 2) noted in his recent book entitled Lessons for Leading in Crisis, a "smooth sea never produced a strong mariner." Perfect storms are developing across our respective campuses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents the author's response to Professor Andrew Zimbalist's views concerning intercollegiate athletics financing. It cites the need for an approach that will give long-term discipline to athletics financing. This approach will include the principles of keeping balanced budgets, complete and transparent national athletic accounting standards and practical budgetary guidelines. It cites factors suggesting the need to act on the financial issues facing Division I football of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA).

The author examines the perspectives of college and university presidents on the sustainability of the financial structure of intercollegiate athletics and its implications for women's sports. She notes how the presidents viewed the question of economic viability only as it related to spending trends in football and basketball and shortened fewer competitions for other sports to keep costs down. She asserts that sports are a powerful part of education but must achieve the goal of financial stability consistent with the educational mission of athletics.

Large athletics programs bring a lot of attention to themselves and the universities of which they are a part. Once, that attention came only from success on the field or court. Now it also comes from how much money these programs spend, and on what, and its source. Calls to use the federal tax code to rein in athletics spending are, we believe, ill-advised. The IRS has limited resources and a lot to do. Its staff members know tax law, not the ins and outs of college athletics. Because universities are adept at "zeroing out" revenues and expenses, it is unlikely that new tax rules and added IRS oversight would do much to curtail spending. They could, however, impose significant compliance costs on universities. The result could be the worst of all worlds: considerable expense on universities to comply; little or no spending reform achieved; and an IRS diverted from core responsibilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses rankings for universities and colleges published by periodicals such as "U.S. News and World Report" and "Businessweek." The author notes that many colleges disputed the results of the periodical's rankings, which measured statistics of student achievement, educational finance and student selection rather than academic quality. He notes that the rankings regarding school finance were based on revenue rather than efficient spending and suggests that the ranking system has led to increases in school costs due to expenses incurred by college presidents to achieve a higher rating.

Past research concerning the effects of college athletics has concentrated on examining the effects of on-field success on increased donations to the university and increased enrollment applications. This research examines the effects of a university's move to NCAA Division I-A football membership on marketing variables, such as attitudes toward the university, perceptions of the university, and behavioral intentions regarding attendance at sporting events and donating money. Members of three important stakeholder groups (students, alumni, and area residents) responded to questions dealing with a university's recent move to Division I-A football. With respect to overall perceptions of I-A football and reactions to the University's recent move to I-A, students, alumni, and the general public believe that I-A football is more prestigious than I-AA football. Further, I-A football status can create a positive image for a university, can attract students to attend the university, is the best sport for fostering alumni involvement with the university, and it enhances school spirit. These results suggest that the positive perceptions associated with I-A can create the solid foundation upon which additional (future) positive experiences and associations can build, leading to greater financial gains in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the ever rising cost of a college education, parents or other supporters must plan early and effectively to ensure that sufficient funds exist for a child's college education. The authors have modified a historic income projector model to aid financial planners in developing personalized college savings strategies. Unlike most of those readily available, the model uses actual (not average) annual historical returns to permit users to "test run" different college savings strategies over different historical periods to determine outcomes. By evaluating outcome risk-return trade-offs, the financial planner may craft an acceptable and effective long-term savings strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is important for university decision makers to carefully scrutinize empirical data concerning the impacts of college athletics on the university as a whole in formulating strategies for athletic programs. This paper reviews and extends existing statistical work on the effects of college athletics using basic concepts from economics as guideposts. Current evidence indicates that success. and at times merely participation, in college athletics provides several benefits including direct financial gain and such indirect benefits as increased university exposure and, in turn, increased financial contributions and increased student applications and enrollment. Evidence concerning negative exposure from events such as NCAA sanctions is sparse but suggests opposite effects of smaller magnitude. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article explores how external universities are doing better in mathematics with high rate of fixed-term contracts at universities with their precarious financing. Topics include comparison with the better-off research organizations from Helmholtz to Max Planck reveals; and basic funding in order to have more planning security and the mass limitations in science to offer reliable qualification and career paths and to secure conducive working conditions.

Over a number of years, universities have needed to become more adept at managing change as internal and external factors affect their longer term financial sustainability. That sustainability is, for many institutions, closely linked to how straightforward (or otherwise) it is to recruit student numbers of the right quality from often diverse markets. However, the scale of a university's financial challenge isn't always enough on its own to dictate how bravely an institution drives its change agenda, nor the nature and pace of change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background/Context: Research on academic capitalism often maps changing conditions in which faculty work occurs without explaining the mechanisms by which change occurs. We use Fligstein and McAdam's theory of fields to posit that the changing conditions in which humanities faculty members work reflect activities in overlapping (the academic profession more generally) and proximate (university administration) fields. We seek to illuminate the ways in which humanities faculty experience heightened administrative authority and strategically respond. Research Questions: We ask: 1) How do faculty members in the humanities understand the changes in their field? 2) How do faculty members in the humanities understand their relationships to members of overlapping (e.g., faculty in other areas) and proximate (e.g., administrators) fields? and 3) How do faculty members in the humanities strategize to improve their positions? Participants: We conducted semistructured interviews with 46 faculty members in humanities fields with various appointments (tenured, tenure-track, non-tenure-track). Faculty participants were mainly housed in English and history, two of the largest humanities departments at many institutions, but also in philosophy and religion departments. Research Design: Our multiple case study design took place at two public research universities to understand how faculty respond to changing conditions. The research sites, typical of many public research universities, experienced declining direct government support and therefore conditions in which academic capitalist processes occur were present at both. Humanities departments contributed a large portion of student credit-hour production at both research sites, yet such funds were centralized and allocated by university administration. Data Collection and Analysis: Our interview protocol focused on faculty perceptions of resource allocation within the institution, allocation of work within the department, perceptions of the department relative to others, and how faculty structured their time and careers in response to various pressures inside and outside of their university. Semistructured interviews ranged from 25 and 90 minutes and were recorded and transcribed. We analyzed data using a priori and emergent codes which were grouped into broad themes reflecting faculty responses to changing conditions. Results: Three strategic responses emerged among humanities faculty members we interviewed: utilizing lower status faculty members, exploiting weaker units in the field, and forming alliances. Conclusions/Recommendations: Strategies result in the improved status of some individual faculty members but do not arrest the diminishing status of the humanities as a field. Our analysis suggests that field-level analyses entail implications for the study of academic work and processes in the academic capitalism tradition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic information may close aspiration disparities for postsecondary education across socioeconomic, ethnic, and partisan divides. In 2017, we estimated impacts of information on such disparities by means of a survey experiment administered to a nationally representative sample of 4,214 adults. A baseline group was asked whether they preferred a 4-year degree, a 2-year degree, or no further education for their oldest child younger than the age of 18 years (or the option they would prefer if they had a child younger than 18 years). Before 3 other randomly selected segments of our sample were asked the same question, they were given either information about (a) both net costs and returns, (b) net costs, or (c) returns to a 2-year and 4-year degree. Information about both costs and returns did not reduce socioeconomic-status disparities but did affect ethnic and partisan divides. The findings suggest that reductions in socioeconomic inequalities in educational opportunity require more than simple changes in the dissemination of information aimed at altering economic cost–benefit calculations. Sustained effort that mitigates deeper-seated cultural and social barriers seems necessary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic institutions invest significant sums of money to serve their students and to influence their decisions to stay. This study sheds light on the challenge for academic institutions to allocate their investments to keep students and enhance their retention rates. This study aims to investigate whether or not providing academic services has affected the retention rate in Ontario's higher education market. The variable of academic services is measured through an examination of the effect of providing student services, technology and library acquisition, and scholarships and bursaries. The retention rate variable reflects students returning to an institution for the second year. The results of this study were reported based on examining the responsiveness; first, for all universities together (the whole market), and then for each university in Ontario's higher education market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose Leaders at higher education institutions (HEIs) in the USA experience substantial pressure to contain costs while advancing their educational missions. The purpose of this paper is to explore the association between publicly stated academic cost-containment objectives found in HEI's strategic plans and mission statements, which help to unify stakeholders and link strategy to an organization's purpose.Design/methodology/approach This paper analyzes mission statements and strategic plans of 57 small, private HEIs in the Northeastern USA. HEIs in this sample published strategic plans with an explicit cost-containment goal. Mission statements were analyzed for readability. Thematic analysis was conducted using the balanced scorecard approach. Associations between a stated academic cost containment goal and mission statement themes are presented using logistic regression.Findings Mission statements of HEIs focused on academic cost containment are wordier and more varied. They tend not to mention "liberal arts," a potential signal of a high-quality, high-cost school; less selective schools may be more likely to emphasize academic cost cutting.Research limitations/implications This paper contributes to the literature demonstrating mission statements' role in goal setting. Further, it considers college costs from college administrators' perspectives. Given the small sample size, future work should expand the sample and use case studies to explore how mission shapes or constrains strategic objectives.Originality/value This is the first paper using qualitative and quantitative analysis to explore the association between the mission statements of small HEIs and academic cost containment goals in strategic plans, documents intended to support differentiation in a crowded market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study presents a formal model of the dynamics of a university's reputation that points to the existence of a snowball effect where alumni donations raise a university's reputation, which in turn generates additional alumni donations. Given that econometric results presented in this study confirm the model's main findings, supporting a university's financial development arm at optimal levels should receive thorough consideration by the university's administration. Our model and empirical results also suggest that university administration should better assess the reputation-enhancing facets of an institution deemed integral by peer institutions, as these determine the outcome of its fundraising efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many countries, including Italy, are increasingly managing their public higher education systems in accordance with the New Public Management principle that private-sector management practices improve efficiency and quality. A key mechanism has been the introduction of performance-based funding systems designed to reward 'high-performing' institutions and incentivise 'lesser-performing' institutions to improve. Instead of improving efficiency and quality across the board, however, we argue that performance-based funding systems naturalise longstanding structurally determined inequalities between institutions by recasting national higher education systems as competitive institutional meritocracies in which institutional inequalities are redefined as objective indicators of intrinsic 'merit' or worth. We illustrate how performance-based university funding systems naturalise pre-existing inequalities between universities drawing on the case of Italy, a country characterised by longstanding inequalities between its northern and southern regions which demonstrably impact on the apparent 'performance' of universities. The concept of institutional meritocracy captures the illusory nature of this performance game. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The impress of corporate management practices on universities is not new. Thorstein Veblen dissected it a century ago, paying special attention to ceremonial discourses and practices that universities used to burnish their image as they competed against one another. A century later, Bonnie Urciuoli has analysed the discourses that liberal arts institutions use to create an image of the product they are selling, the 'good student' who will make a good corporate employee. For both authors, these institutional imaginaries have real effects, diverting faculty and student attention from the work of critical social analysis to curry favour with elites upon whom colleges and universities depend for financial support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greenhouse Studios | Scholarly Communications Design at UConn is a shared venture of the School of Fine Arts, UConn Library, and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Connecticut. Backed by long-term university investments of staff and space, Greenhouse Studios aims to institute on its university's campus, and share with others involved in academic publishing, a workflow and work culture suited to the creation of multimodal scholarly communications. This article summarizes the research, undertaken with support from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, that informed the development of a design-based, inquiry-driven, collaboration-first model of scholarly production that places continuous, close, and equitable scholarly communications labour at the heart of its mission. The model draws together divided workflows and flattens counter-productive hierarchies that, as vestiges of print-only traditions, impede fuller realization of the possibilities offered by the diverse range of digital and hybrid forms that increasingly define the publishing landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study was conducted on State Public Universities (SPU) in Mexico to ascertain the possible existence of a correlation between their performance in their indicators of academic excellence and the level of allocation of financial resources obtained from the main sources of funding from the federal government. By means of the determination of the academic and financial indicators used by the main international and national organisms, a methodological proposal of statistical analysis was constructed to evaluate the academic performance of SPU and its correlation with the reception of financial resources. The results showed that there is insufficient evidence to infer that obtaining better academic results in Mexican SPU is a reliable predictor to obtain greater financial resources. This demonstrates the need for a clear policy in the allocation of resources to institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on financial problems facing private colleges. The purpose of this article is to discuss the problem of providing an analytical overview of financial crisis in private colleges, including a model of the financial condition of a private college. Accounting methods that will shed light on the financial distress are also provided. Further attention is given to finding the meaning of descriptive financial data which private colleges have. The last part of the paper contains information about the analytic description of distress and the empirical results.

Budgeting in universities has been viewed most often from the perspective of the department or resource recipient. This paper adds the administrative perspective, the budget structure, and the openness of the budget process to the departmental perspective in order to develop a greater understanding of university budgeting. Several hypotheses about the relative use of objective criteria and political power in budgeting critical resources are proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study adopted an institutional perspective to examine how, by whom, and for what purposes societal expectations of acceptable budgetary practices are articulated, enforced, and modified during a period of organizational decline. Data for the study were gathered on a large university system's budgeting process both through extensive archival documents that included working papers, internal memoranda, newspaper coverage, and formal budget submissions and through in-depth interviews with key budgetary actors. The paper shows how specific individuals in both the organization and the larger social context actively invent and then articulate institutionalized expectations regarding organizational policies and procedures. These expectations are quite specific, procedural, and enforceable. This study also shows that the process of institutionalization appears to be infused with power and self-interest both within the organization and in extraorganizational relations, with extraorganizational relations appearing to play a dominant role in periods of organizational decline. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper seeks to determine the nature of budget decision making in a university. Using a research design employing cross-sectional and longitudinal data, the analysis explores whether budgeting conforms more closely to a bureaucratic model of organization or to a coalitional model of organization. The data suggest that coalitional behavior is most easily discernible in budget decision making when resources are relatively scarce. Thus, decisions about resource allocation tend to conform more with behavior predicted by coalitional theory, at least during periods of relative scarcity of resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The effect of subunit power on resource allocation decisions in one university is examined. Measures of departmental power in a university are found to be significantly related to the proportion of the budget received, even after statistically controlling for such universalistic bases of allocation as work load of the department, national rank, and number of faculty. Subunit power in the organization is also related to the correlation between a subunit's resources-budget and instructional staff-and work load over time. The more powerful the department, the less the allocated resources are a function of departmental work load and student demand for course offerings. Subunit power is measured by both interviews of department heads and the analysis of archival records of departmental representation on major university committees. lntercorrelations between these measures of subunit power indicate that it is possible to obtain unobtrusive measures of organizational political systems without direct interviewing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]