Valparaiso University President José Padilla listens to a question from the audience during the community town hall held Tuesday, September 20, 2022 in Valparaiso, Indiana. (Andy Lavalley for the Post-Tribune)
Valparaiso University President José Padilla easily admits the small, private Lutheran institution has faced some challenges.
Despite a slight uptick this academic year, enrollment has been on the decline overall since the fall of 2015 when, including the now-closed law school, the university hosted a peak of 4,544 students.
Even removing the law school’s 445 students enrolled that year, the student body has continued to shrink. In all, 3,808 students enrolled in the fall of 2018, the first year there were no law students. A year later, the last academic year before the pandemic, the university lost almost 300 students.
By last fall, the number of students was down to 2,939, though the university gained around 100 students when students returned in August, something Padilla and other university officials see as a hopeful sign.
Beyond the student enrollment, the university has fewer faculty and staff as well, though Padilla said some of those cuts were planned before the pandemic. Since the start of the pandemic in March 2020, VU has had a 17% reduction in full-time faculty and staff positions, or 135 positions in total.
That includes 55 faculty and staff members who took an incentivized early retirement after Padilla started as president on March 1, 2021.
“Those 55 folks to us was a success, so right now we feel really good about the number of faculty and staff,” he said.
In a one-on-one interview with the Post-Tribune and in a recent town hall meeting, held Sept. 20 in the community room of the Christopher Center, Padilla outlined the university’s new strategic plan, drafted by a committee of around 70 campus community members and approved by the Board of Trustees in July.
He and the other university officials who joined him during the town hall, which included a wide swath of community leaders from the Valparaiso schools, the city of Valparaiso and several nonprofits, insist that the university is on a solid foundation going forward as they embark on what they said is an ambitious five-year plan to boost enrollment, create student leaders and further diversify the campus by making the university one of the Hispanic Serving Institutions.
Some of the more immediate concerns being addressed in the strategic plan are increasing revenue and enrollment.
The strategic plan notes that by the plan’s end, “the Office of Enrollment Management and Marketing shall phase in an increase of the net tuition revenue per student by 10%.”
That, said Padilla, will be accomplished with a 10% decrease in the discount rate for students over a five-year period, “not overnight.”
The percentage, he said, is the average across the board tuition discount that VU offers its students. Some students receive more or less than that amount, based on their household income.
“The discount means, that’s tuition we’re not getting,” Padilla said, adding higher education has become an “arms race” in discounts for students.
“It’s unsustainable for universities to continue with those high discount rates,” he said. “Any percentage drop could be in the range of $100,000 to $500,000 depending on the circumstances but ultimately, it increases our net revenue.”
As far as enrollment, Padilla said the whole dynamic of higher education has changed, with the COVID-19 pandemic bringing those changes to the surface. The percentage of Indiana students attending college has dropped from 65% in 2015 to 53% seven years later.
Additionally, a “demographic cliff” has been predicted to hit by 2026, with a significant drop in the percentage of young adults ages 18 to 24 attending college, particularly in the Midwest and the Northeast.
“It’s kind of unrealistic to say we’re a 3,000 (enrolled student) school going to 4,500,” Padilla said, adding that could be the goal 10 years out.
In the meantime, the university is working with a consultant on what Padilla called “aggressive but smart” growth for VU, for a total enrollment that’s sustainable for the university.
“We’re not just going to grow for growth’s sake,” he said.
Other initiatives to boost enrollment include the Access College, the two-year associate degree program, which Padilla said can help serve as the springboard for students who wouldn’t otherwise have the opportunity to attend college.
“We can provide them with the type of love and care they deserve,” he said.
Additionally, to become a Hispanic Serving Institution, VU must have a student body that is at least 25% Hispanic, Padilla said, noting that accreditation offers the university many benefits, including a boost for federal grant applications. Indiana University Northwest is currently the only local university meeting that criteria.
The university also wants to tap into a growing demographic.
“Coming here to campus will make us more rich in terms of our society,” he said.
The university’s endowment stands at $364.5 million. VU held a capital campaign, “Forever Valpo,” that started in September 2016 and raised more than $302.3 million. The campaign goal was $250 million, according to the campaign website, www.valpo.edu/forevervalpo/.
But not all of that money is cash on hand. Much of it was given for a specific purpose, such as a faculty endowment chair or a campus facility project, or for scholarships for students in particular majors. A portion of the funds also is pledged through estates and that money isn’t available until the benefactor dies.
A university spokesman said officials don’t share how much of the endowment is available in cash.
The university’s endowment, Padilla said, “is really good for a school our size.” The university is able to draw a certain percentage of the endowment each year.
“We’re not any different than any other university in our percentages,” he said, adding the funds from the endowment have “been enough for us to meet our needs and our initiatives.”
Funding for the strategic plan will come from what the university has on hand as well as some fundraising, Padilla said, particularly for a new athletics building and facility for the nursing school, which could be built in the Chicago area in collaboration with a health care provider there.
“We have to figure out what it’s going to cost us,” Padilla said, adding the university is engaging architects to come up with options and the respective price tags because the university would need board approval for any fundraising campaign.
Other campus facilities and university property are being evaluated as well. An April 29 fire gutted the Art-Psychology building on campus, though no one was injured. An official with the Valparaiso Fire Department has said the fire started in the northeast corner of the building, in a wood shop area, and that the cause of the fire was undetermined because of the extensive damage.
“We are still in the process of deciding whether to rebuild,” Padilla said, adding there was sufficient space in other buildings for the art studios and programming in the facility, as well as those for the psychology department.
He expects a determination by the end of the year.
“Part of it is going to be dictated by what we hear from the insurance companies,” he said.
Mark Volpatti, the university’s vice president for finance, said during the town hall meeting that university officials are working with a structural engineer to determine whether the building can be salvaged.
Wiseman Hall, which formerly housed the law school, is now being used for the Access College, a pilot program this year which offers students two-year associate degrees and the opportunity to continue their studies at VU if they so choose, Padilla said, adding there is also talk of moving other departments to the building that have outgrown their space.
“The law school would be the perfect place for that,” Padilla said.
Heritage Hall, also previously part of the law school, is now home of the president’s office, which moved this year from Kretzmann Hall, and the second floor of Heritage is the advancement office.
The Vitalize Valpo initiative is being developed by AVRO Development, LLC, a university subsidiary working to sell or possibly develop university-owned properties in a partnership with other ventures, Padilla said.
The land, according to vitalizevalpo.com, includes about 7 acres in the 1200 block of Lincolnway dubbed the 3D parcel; Sturdy Road and Eastgate, a combined 80 acres, envisioned for mixed use and senior housing, with an RFP for the land released in March; more than 25 acres in an area called Old Campus, which includes Heritage and Wiseman halls; and more than 8 acres at 2500 Silhavy Road, near the intersection of Indiana 49 and Vale Park Road.
Jim Rawlinson, project executive with Veridus Group Inc., the Indianapolis real estate holding agency partnering with VU in the project, declined to give an estimate on how much the property might be worth. The total acreage was not immediately clear from the Vitalize Valpo website
“I’m not sure we could put a number on it,” he said in an email. “We think there are some really valuable parcels that AVRO is holding though, and we are excited about the conversations we are having with developers for reuse.”
The community town hall, one in a series held on campus every few months, featured an appearance by VU’s new mascots, golden retriever Beacon and chocolate Lab Blaze, as well as questions and comments from the audience.
Center Township Trustee Jesse Harper, who noted he was a product of both community college and VU’s law school, asked what the university is doing to reach out to nontraditional students who are not college-age alongside the university’s efforts to increase diversity, equity and inclusion on campus.
“The idea is to create new opportunities for students here at Valpo,” said Brian O’Rourke, VU’s vice president for enrollment, marketing and communications.
That includes people who hadn’t considered a four-year institution or who didn’t have the academic background to succeed.
“We’re not trying to compete with Ivy Tech. They’re doing an incredible job,” but instead offering wraparound services for a two-year program as students decide whether to continue in college or move into the workforce, O’Rourke said.
The effort, he added, includes accommodating adult learners who are juggling jobs and family and require a different infrastructure than other students.
George Douglas, the city of Valparaiso’s development director and a former City Council member, commended Padilla and the work he’s done since taking over as president on March 1, 2021.
“I think you’re doing an amazing job in a short period of time with the strategic plan and surrounding yourself with a strong team,” he said. “On behalf of the city, I think the relationship with the community is getting stronger and stronger. Certainly, we share the same name.”
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