(no subject)
Sep. 29th, 2005 09:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
holytoastrTulane prepares for January reopening
Students offered tuition-free term
By Steve Ritea
Staff writer
Tulane University, the region's largest academic institution and one of its biggest employers, on Wednesday announced that classes will resume Jan. 17 and an extra tuition-free semester will be offered in May and June for students who need to catch up.
University President Scott Cowen, who will return to campus today for the first time since the week Hurricane Katrina hit, said the university anticipates at least 90 percent of students will return for the spring semester.
Although it is unclear how many of the schools' 13,000 students are taking classes at other universities, getting most of those students to return is essential to the university's fiscal health, he said.
"Even if 80 percent came back, we would be able to maneuver to financial viability," he said. "Sixty percent would be difficult."
The university's $810 million endowment is smaller than most schools its size and it collects an additional $700 million in annual revenue.
But Cowen said there is good reason to be encouraged, noting that only 78 students have officially withdrawn from Tulane.
To that end, the university is offering a number of incentives. It is reimbursing tuition for students who enrolled at other campuses and is offering the intensive "lagniappe semester" in late spring and early summer.
Students can earn up to 12 hours of credit tuition-free during the semester, assuming they've already paid regular fall and spring tuition. Undergraduate seniors who cannot attend the lagniappe semester can receive $5,000 tuition credit toward an advanced degree at Tulane.
University College, the continuing education wing of Tulane, is starting courses Oct. 24 at Elmwood and Biloxi sites, as well as online.
Amid Tulane's announcement, other major universities are gearing up to allow students' return in the coming months. Loyola also plans to reopen in January, although an exact date has not been set, and the University of New Orleans' lakefront campus is also expecting to resume classes in January. UNO also announced Wednesday the opening of enrollment for classes at satellite campuses in Jefferson and St. Tammany parishes that begin Oct. 10.
Dillard University sustained severe flooding after Katrina and is not expected to reopen during this academic year, its president said, although some classes could be offered at other sites in January. Xavier University officials could not be reached for comment.
The Saturday before Katrina hit, Cowen said some 1,700 students and their parents were moving into campus residence halls when news of the approaching storm prompted Cowen to call a town-hall meeting. There, everyone was told to evacuate on their own or was promised a spot on one of more than 15 buses the university chartered to take students to Jackson State University in Mississippi, where about 600 rode out the storm.
Cowen and some core staff stayed behind in the university's Reily Center, where they waited out Katrina. On Monday afternoon, Cowen said he took a walk around campus and was encouraged, finding mostly broken windows and debris littering lawns and walkways.
"My feeling was, 'We can get this fixed in a month,'" he recalled.
Later that night, however, after news came out that several of the city's levees had been breached, water began to rise around campus, with up to 3 feet in some areas.
Although the campus still fared exceedingly well, Cowen said there were some casualties, not the least of which were a collection of government documents in the basement of the campus library, which was soaked with floodwaters.
The university also lost a number of laboratory animals, although some survived a trip to the university's primate center on the north shore, along with 33 years of blood samples, part of a study of adolescent heart disease in Bogalusa, after 27 large freezers on campus lost generator power.
By Thursday, Cowen and the last few staff remaining on campus hopped into a motorboat, which took them to dry land on Freret Street, where one of his aides hotwired a golf cart. They then drove to Gibson Hall, where they found a university dump truck that could get them through deeper waters and into Audubon Park, where a helicopter retrieved them.
Cowen has been in Texas since then, working with his staff to prepare for the spring semester out of an office park in Houston.
Meantime, the university is still paying its 6,000 employees, except for some part-timers, for the entire fall semester - a commitment, Cowen said, that so far has prevented any faculty from being poached by other universities.
Besides, he said, "I think the vast majority of universities will not actively recruit unless they felt we weren't going to reopen, which of course we are."
So far, he said, only four staff members have said they're taking jobs elsewhere.
As for displaced students, a number of universities are allowing them to enroll in classes tuition-free, letting Tulane keep the roughly $13,500 charged each semester. While students at those schools typically have to pay for room and board, Cowen said those costs will be reimbursed to all students. Students who had to pay tuition at other universities will be reimbursed for those costs, he said, either by the university or Tulane.
Meantime, there is reason to be encouraged about the future of the student body, Cowen said, noting that applications for the fall 2006 semester are up 50 percent over the same time last year.
"We're clawing our way back and that is attracting a lot of attention," he said, "particularly among kids interested in community service."
Cowen said he does not expect the university's academic standards to change. Even if fewer students were to apply, he said, "if anything, we'll accept fewer students."
The university accepted about 40 percent of the 18,000 freshman applications for this fall. The vast majority of those students graduated in the top 10 percent of their class and had an average SAT score of 1355 out of a possible 1600.
The university has also blocked student athletes from transferring their scholarships to other campuses, Cowen said. Faculty have also been asked to postpone sabbaticals.
Because the campus' dormitories only have space for 3,300 students and homes of staff and students flooded, the university is considering ways to provide temporary housing, everything from leasing a cruise ship to constructing temporary housing, he said.
Cowen declined to say where that temporary housing would be located or whether it could be in nearby Audubon Park.
At The Boot, a popular campus hangout on Broadway, doors were swung wide for ventilation, and a lone worker inspected the inside the bar at the edge of campus. The dark interior looked relatively clean. Another worker outside of a Plum Street dorm said, "I think we're going to make the January date."
Guards had cut off campus access points such as the entrance to Ben Weiner Drive, but most buildings appeared to have weathered both storms well. Swaths of green grass were visible around the campus' interior.
Trailer-size generators and Belfor restoration trucks were parked along Freret Street, where chairs and bags of trash were piled outside the university library. Workers wearing decontamination suits gathered at the entrance.
At the main entrance to Tulane on Wednesday, three professors and their friends were turned away by armed security guards. They were trying to retrieve manuscripts and teaching materials, said French and Italian professor Hope Glidden, but "not the way they've got it locked up at the moment."
"We came from all over the Eastern Seaboard to be here today," said Jane Carter, a classical studies professor. "We thought we had permission." She said the group - coming from Chicago, Boston and Austin, Texas - had called Monday for passes and received them.
Carter, who is working as a visiting professor in Austin, said the students she has talked to are eager to return in winter. One told her, "I'm coming back to campus next term," she said.
Staff writer Bruce Hamilton contributed to this report.
Steve Ritea can be reached at sritea@hotmail.com.
Students offered tuition-free term
By Steve Ritea
Staff writer
Tulane University, the region's largest academic institution and one of its biggest employers, on Wednesday announced that classes will resume Jan. 17 and an extra tuition-free semester will be offered in May and June for students who need to catch up.
University President Scott Cowen, who will return to campus today for the first time since the week Hurricane Katrina hit, said the university anticipates at least 90 percent of students will return for the spring semester.
Although it is unclear how many of the schools' 13,000 students are taking classes at other universities, getting most of those students to return is essential to the university's fiscal health, he said.
"Even if 80 percent came back, we would be able to maneuver to financial viability," he said. "Sixty percent would be difficult."
The university's $810 million endowment is smaller than most schools its size and it collects an additional $700 million in annual revenue.
But Cowen said there is good reason to be encouraged, noting that only 78 students have officially withdrawn from Tulane.
To that end, the university is offering a number of incentives. It is reimbursing tuition for students who enrolled at other campuses and is offering the intensive "lagniappe semester" in late spring and early summer.
Students can earn up to 12 hours of credit tuition-free during the semester, assuming they've already paid regular fall and spring tuition. Undergraduate seniors who cannot attend the lagniappe semester can receive $5,000 tuition credit toward an advanced degree at Tulane.
University College, the continuing education wing of Tulane, is starting courses Oct. 24 at Elmwood and Biloxi sites, as well as online.
Amid Tulane's announcement, other major universities are gearing up to allow students' return in the coming months. Loyola also plans to reopen in January, although an exact date has not been set, and the University of New Orleans' lakefront campus is also expecting to resume classes in January. UNO also announced Wednesday the opening of enrollment for classes at satellite campuses in Jefferson and St. Tammany parishes that begin Oct. 10.
Dillard University sustained severe flooding after Katrina and is not expected to reopen during this academic year, its president said, although some classes could be offered at other sites in January. Xavier University officials could not be reached for comment.
The Saturday before Katrina hit, Cowen said some 1,700 students and their parents were moving into campus residence halls when news of the approaching storm prompted Cowen to call a town-hall meeting. There, everyone was told to evacuate on their own or was promised a spot on one of more than 15 buses the university chartered to take students to Jackson State University in Mississippi, where about 600 rode out the storm.
Cowen and some core staff stayed behind in the university's Reily Center, where they waited out Katrina. On Monday afternoon, Cowen said he took a walk around campus and was encouraged, finding mostly broken windows and debris littering lawns and walkways.
"My feeling was, 'We can get this fixed in a month,'" he recalled.
Later that night, however, after news came out that several of the city's levees had been breached, water began to rise around campus, with up to 3 feet in some areas.
Although the campus still fared exceedingly well, Cowen said there were some casualties, not the least of which were a collection of government documents in the basement of the campus library, which was soaked with floodwaters.
The university also lost a number of laboratory animals, although some survived a trip to the university's primate center on the north shore, along with 33 years of blood samples, part of a study of adolescent heart disease in Bogalusa, after 27 large freezers on campus lost generator power.
By Thursday, Cowen and the last few staff remaining on campus hopped into a motorboat, which took them to dry land on Freret Street, where one of his aides hotwired a golf cart. They then drove to Gibson Hall, where they found a university dump truck that could get them through deeper waters and into Audubon Park, where a helicopter retrieved them.
Cowen has been in Texas since then, working with his staff to prepare for the spring semester out of an office park in Houston.
Meantime, the university is still paying its 6,000 employees, except for some part-timers, for the entire fall semester - a commitment, Cowen said, that so far has prevented any faculty from being poached by other universities.
Besides, he said, "I think the vast majority of universities will not actively recruit unless they felt we weren't going to reopen, which of course we are."
So far, he said, only four staff members have said they're taking jobs elsewhere.
As for displaced students, a number of universities are allowing them to enroll in classes tuition-free, letting Tulane keep the roughly $13,500 charged each semester. While students at those schools typically have to pay for room and board, Cowen said those costs will be reimbursed to all students. Students who had to pay tuition at other universities will be reimbursed for those costs, he said, either by the university or Tulane.
Meantime, there is reason to be encouraged about the future of the student body, Cowen said, noting that applications for the fall 2006 semester are up 50 percent over the same time last year.
"We're clawing our way back and that is attracting a lot of attention," he said, "particularly among kids interested in community service."
Cowen said he does not expect the university's academic standards to change. Even if fewer students were to apply, he said, "if anything, we'll accept fewer students."
The university accepted about 40 percent of the 18,000 freshman applications for this fall. The vast majority of those students graduated in the top 10 percent of their class and had an average SAT score of 1355 out of a possible 1600.
The university has also blocked student athletes from transferring their scholarships to other campuses, Cowen said. Faculty have also been asked to postpone sabbaticals.
Because the campus' dormitories only have space for 3,300 students and homes of staff and students flooded, the university is considering ways to provide temporary housing, everything from leasing a cruise ship to constructing temporary housing, he said.
Cowen declined to say where that temporary housing would be located or whether it could be in nearby Audubon Park.
At The Boot, a popular campus hangout on Broadway, doors were swung wide for ventilation, and a lone worker inspected the inside the bar at the edge of campus. The dark interior looked relatively clean. Another worker outside of a Plum Street dorm said, "I think we're going to make the January date."
Guards had cut off campus access points such as the entrance to Ben Weiner Drive, but most buildings appeared to have weathered both storms well. Swaths of green grass were visible around the campus' interior.
Trailer-size generators and Belfor restoration trucks were parked along Freret Street, where chairs and bags of trash were piled outside the university library. Workers wearing decontamination suits gathered at the entrance.
At the main entrance to Tulane on Wednesday, three professors and their friends were turned away by armed security guards. They were trying to retrieve manuscripts and teaching materials, said French and Italian professor Hope Glidden, but "not the way they've got it locked up at the moment."
"We came from all over the Eastern Seaboard to be here today," said Jane Carter, a classical studies professor. "We thought we had permission." She said the group - coming from Chicago, Boston and Austin, Texas - had called Monday for passes and received them.
Carter, who is working as a visiting professor in Austin, said the students she has talked to are eager to return in winter. One told her, "I'm coming back to campus next term," she said.
Staff writer Bruce Hamilton contributed to this report.
Steve Ritea can be reached at sritea@hotmail.com.
