Smaller, religiously affiliated campuses are often the best option for rural students, but many are 'fighting to survive'

St. Ambrose and Mount Mercy are working to unite, so both
can remain open. (Photo by M. Rundle, Hechinger Report)

Smaller religious colleges that offer rural students a place to pursue higher education are struggling to keep their doors open. To combat ongoing financial woes, many religiously affiliated colleges are creating ways to join forces with like-minded colleges.

"Rural students often have few options other than religious institutions fighting to survive," reports Jon Marcus for The Hechinger Report. "The heads of St. Ambrose and Mount Mercy, in Iowa, said they’ve watched as nearby religiously affiliated colleges, athletic rivals and institutions that employed their friends and former colleagues closed."

As the number of students graduating from high school shrinks, smaller colleges face dwindling enrollments and rocky financial futures. Marcus writes, "The threats to smaller religiously affiliated institutions in rural areas stem largely from the downturn in the already short supply of high school graduates choosing to enroll. The proportion of such students going straight to college has fallen even more sharply in many largely rural states."

The schools merging or working out unique collaborations with other colleges are striving to protect both institutions from closures or drastic reductions in majors or student services. "Ursuline College in Ohio, for instance, which has fewer than 1,000 students, has agreed to merge with larger Gannon University, 95 miles away. Both are Catholic," Marcus adds. "Bluffton University in Ohio, which is Mennonite, is looking for a new partner after a planned merger fell through in February and the president resigned."

Religiously affiliated institutions often serve more "rural areas where access to higher education is more limited than in urban and suburban places and is becoming less available still as public universities in rural states have merged or closed or cut dozens of majors," Marcus reports. St. Ambrose President Amy Novak told Marcus, “We serve the poor. We educate the poor. That is a risky financial proposition at the moment for small, regional institutions that are largely tuition-driven.”

For Hechinger’s list of all college closures since 2008, click here.