America’s Colleges Need to Tighten Their Belts

Over the past month, the usually placid campus of West Virginia University has been roiled by student protests and a faculty vote of no confidence in the school’s president, Gordon Gee, over his plan to impose sweeping budget cuts. The uproar is a sign of what’s in store for other public universities in an era of falling enrollment — and many have only themselves to blame.

West Virginia’s board of governors will vote today on Gee’s proposal to eliminate 169 faculty positions and 10% of undergraduate and graduate majors at the university’s flagship campus. Students will no longer be able to major in any foreign languages; only Spanish and Mandarin will even still be offered in-person. Some graduate degrees in mathematics and music, among other subjects, will be discontinued. If the cuts go through, dozens of professors could lose their jobs by the end of the current academic year.

Gee has defended his actions as necessary to plug the university’s budget deficit, which is expected to grow from $45 million to $75 million by 2028. He blames the shortfall on years of cuts in public funding and lower-than-projected tuition revenue, caused by fewer college-going high-school graduates in West Virginia and steep drops in out-of-state and foreign-student enrollment. Phasing out undersubscribed programs, Gee says, will allow the school to invest in subjects that are “relevant to the students of today and the industry of tomorrow.”

The focus on better preparing students for the workforce is certainly welcome. Yet Gee’s call for budget discipline would be more convincing if his administration hadn’t approved a decade-long splurge on new and renovated academic buildings, dormitories and sports facilities. Since 2010, debt has increased from $380 million to more than $960 million. Meanwhile, the number of non-teaching administrators doubled between 2013 and 2022, with administrative salaries rising by $50 million over that time — even as enrollment dropped by 15%.

West Virginia’s profligacy isn’t unique. Spending at the country’s 50 flagship public universities has soared by 38% in the past two decades, paid for largely through increases in tuition and fees. That model worked when demand for college was high, as students tapped government loans to finance their educations, with few limits attached. But a tight labor market and growing doubts about the value of a college degree have caused enrollment to sink to a two-decade low. For all but the most prestigious institutions, that trend is likely to continue: West Virginia expects the size of its student body to shrink to fewer than 21,000 within a decade, one-third smaller than in 2014.

Colleges need to adjust to this reality, or get overrun by it. Instead of sacrificing vital academic programs, as Gee proposes, school leaders should look first to slash bureaucratic bloat and reduce lavish outlays — such as buying Italian monasteries to host study-abroad students and building video-game lounges — that may entice students but do little to enhance instruction. Streamlining degree requirements so that students can earn their diplomas faster would help schools save on staffing and overhead.

At the state level, elected officials should insist that the boards of public universities exercise proper budget oversight and reduce exorbitant salaries for presidents and other administrators. And rather than pursue misguided and costly student-loan debt cancelation policies that only serve to drive up the cost of college, President Joe Biden should work with Congress to require greater transparency from colleges about the full cost of attendance, as well as graduates’ earnings and loan-default rates, which would allow consumers to make more informed decisions and deter schools from simply raising tuition to cover runaway costs.

With more young Americans forgoing college, public universities like West Virginia face a reckoning after years of free-spending excess. It’s time for them to tighten their belts, and students shouldn’t have to pay the price.

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