What did you spend for coronavirus bailout money for higher Ed institutions? Harvard decided not to apply for their $9 million share of the $2.2 trillion CARES Act. With an endowment of over $40 billion that is very gracious.
It took President Trump bringing the issue to the national limelight to make it happen. Princeton followed suit.
Government giving money to higher ed
The following statistics are from an article in Forbes magazine. The research is OpenTheBooks.com’s. They are a government spending watchdog group.
The other Ivies are still deciding whether to accept up to $62.9 million in CARES money. It is low hanging fruit, easy money. It looks like they will take it despite their collective endowment of $140 billion. It’s good to know who the good citizens are, don’t you think?
The auditors at OpenTheBooks.com found these are just the tip of the educational iceberg. From the U.S. Department of Education website, they found the full higher Ed database. Did you know 5,137 colleges and universities are recipients of $12.5 billion in coronavirus relief? Did you know none of it requires repayment?
There are 530 schools in California and 389 in New York with allocations. There are 295 in Texas, 261 in Florida, and 260 in Pennsylvania with allocations. OpenTheBooks.com has an interactive map showing where the $12.5 billion in CARES Act funding went in America’s institutions of higher education.
The five colleges and universities allocated the most money are Arizona State University with $63.5 million. Next comes Penn State with $55 million. The third is Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey with $54.1 million. Then comes the University of Central Florida at $51.1 million. And number 5, Miami Dade College with $49.1 million.
Five facts about the coronavirus bailout of America’s colleges and universities:
#1. The 25 universities with the largest endowments were:
Allocated $801.3 million in coronavirus subsidies. These wealthy institutions had a collective $350 billion in endowments.
Notre Dame with an $8.4 billion endowment has an allocation of $5.8 million. The school told OpenTheBooks.com they will not apply for the funds. Instead, their share will go back to the U.S. Treasury Department’s general fund.
Here are the allocations of some other wealthy schools: Ohio State University with an endowment of $3.6 billion has an allocation of $42 million. Northwestern University with an endowment of $9.7 billion has an allocation of $8.5 million. The University of Chicago with an endowment of $7 billion has an allocation of $6.2 million. Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) with an endowment of $13.2 billion has an allocation of $5 million.
The biggest systems have allocations of the most bailout money: Penn State $55 million on a $3.6 billion endowment. Texas A&M $82.2 million on a $10.5 billion endowment. University of Texas $173 million on a $24.2 billion endowment. The University of California $260 million on an $8.3 billion endowment.
#2. Big 10 Conference is #1 in the battle among the major conferences.
The fourteen schools of the Big 10 Conference are receiving allocation the most bailout money. They will receive $393 million. That’s an average of $28 million per institution.
The Pacific-12 Conference has an allocation of $318 million.
The Southeastern Conference (SEC) has fourteen schools and an allocation of $280.2 million.
The fifteen schools of the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) have an allocation of just $194 million.
#3. Worst junior colleges: The 50 worst community colleges scored by WalletHub received $200 million in taxpayer funding. Collectively, these schools had a graduation rate of 12.3% (2017-2018).
The top 10 worst schools have an allocation of $66 million. This is despite reporting graduation rates between 4%-9%. The U.S. taxpayer may want to know why these schools are even allowed to operate.
#4. Beauty schools called cosmetology colleges:
409 “cosmetology colleges” have an allocation of $102.7 million in bailout money. Many times these schools charge higher student tuition prices than universities. It’s a phenomenon. Taxpayer dollars in the form of Pell grants and student loans drive up the cost of education.
The Empire Beauty School has an allocation of the most coronavirus funds at nearly $18 million. Interestingly the school admits to charging up to $22,100 in tuition and fees. That exceeds the in-state tuition costs of all Big Ten universities except Northwestern. It’s a 35-40 week program and graduates qualify to cut hair, manicure nails and do massage therapy.
Other non-traditional colleges have allocations. This includes but is not limited to a professional golf college at $84,000. There are two schools of wooden boat building at $107,000. And there is a bartending and gambling school at $558,000. There are 24 art academies with allocations of an aggregate $29 million.
#5. Red states vs. blue states: OpenTheBooks.com auditors found colleges and universities in the thirty states that voted for President Trump in 2016 have allocations of $6.8 billion. Institutions in states that did not vote for Trump have an allocation of $5.4 billion.
Those summary numbers obscure the fact blue state allocation is more money on average than the red states. The breakdown is $270 million vs. $222 million.
This is because blue states had more higher-ed institutions than the red states.
In the twenty blue states, there were 2,155 institutions with allocations. That’s an average of 108 schools per state. The thirty red states had 2,853 institutions, that’s an average of 95 schools per state.
The rest of the aid amounts to approximately $389 million. This allocation is to 128 institutions. They are in Washington, D.C., or U.S. territories, i.e. Puerto Rico, Guam, etc.
There are 16 U.S. colleges and universities that do not accept federal money.
The most prominent are Hillsdale College in Michigan, Grove City College in Pennsylvania, and Patrick Henry College in Virginia. Hillsdale has never taken any aid directly from the federal government. This has allowed the college to operate without government interference and with maximum institutional independence.
None of the sixteen colleges got any allocation of coronavirus bailout money. These schools made the decision long ago to pay their own way. Did you know there are only 16 of 5,137 colleges and universities that are not controlled or influenced by government money?