Ohio announced the latest in a seemingly never-ending series of price increases. No. 1 justification? Declining enrollment.
Only in the world of higher education do you raise prices when demand for your product declines.
This is true!
rpbobcat mentioned the administrative bloat in an engineering school. I remember several people in our medical school who had the title of "assistant to the associate dean for XYZ." To be fair, in this case these were real jobs with lots of responsibilities, and they were very much needed. Medical education is a strange beast. However, I was always taken aback by the titles.
How many colleges does OU have? 9? 10? Does each have its own development staff?
How about some schools within the colleges? Do they have their own development staffs?
Having worked at three Fortune 500 companies, I saw staff bloat as something almost inevitable. When times were good, at a senior staff meeting, one person would say, "I have an idea that could significantly increase sales (or market penetration or something else). To make it happen I need an extra manager." No one at the table would object. Why? Because they knew they also might be proposing something similar.
Then when the next inevitable recession hit - I worked through the ones in 1971, 1981, 1991, 2001 and 2008 - cutbacks became the order of the day.
I wonder how seriously OU has considered consolidating some staffs - and increasing effectiveness.