Elon University - NewCentury@Elon

Martha and Spencer Love School of Business Advisory Board
Discussion Summary – Oct. 7, 2005
"On Arriving, Deepening and Sustaining: Key Questions about Elon University's Future"

If you visit Elon in 2020, what values and attributes of today’s Elon would you want to have been preserved?

Commitment to attract quality students
Small classrooms and personal attention
Physical campus appearance
Culture to achieve excellence
Keep Elon’s culture and emphasis on strong teaching
Retain affordable cost
Keep low student-faculty ratio
Study abroad and global emphasis
High student retention
Balanced growth
Posing real-world, ambiguous problems to students
Close student-professor relationships
Sense of community
Earnest, excited and passionate

What would you hope to find in 2020 that is not at Elon today? How would you go about making that happen?

Create distinctive programs
More of a holistic approach to student’s learning and development
Improve quality of teaching
More diversity
Convention center
Daytime MBA
Strengthen Executive Education and MBA
Synergy between Law School and Love School
Possible JD/MBA
Increase endowment
Still affordable
Increase tuition
Internships and semester abroad
15 Endowed chairs
More scholarships, international students
Foreign language requirement
Adult education
Much more community involvement including adult education
More academic rigor
Successful law school
Maintain excellent leadership, charm, likeability
Good fundraisers
Succession planning
Cutting edge technology and flexibility
Be Nimble, Be Quick!!

Responses to specific questions

Question One: How specifically can Elon further develop a culture of philanthropy in our community? What are the most compelling messages we can bring before donors as we strive to build Elon’s endowment? What are the roles of trustees, alumni, faculty, staff, students, parents, and friends in such a long term endeavor?

Culture of Philanthropy
1. How do we define community as it relates to our donor constituencies?
2. To build endowment: must reach beyond our geographic region
3. Educate students who go on to lead successful careers.
4. Start with current students as fundraisers and donors – instill importance early
5. Student volunteerism
6. Targeted asks for endowment
7. Alumni engagement
8. 54% of Elon Alum are less than 40 years old
Compelling messages to sell endowments
1. Rankings and objective measures of quality help sell
2. The impact of a gift to Elon is better, bigger than at most schools
3. Value for your money – our gifts are managed and leveraged by ethical leaders-better value here
4. Sell the students on stories and messages
Role of Friends
1. Spread the word
2. Trustees must maintain the institution-keep it sound and stable
3. Faculty/staff must continue quality teaching/leadership
4. We’re all ambassadors
5. Pride in Elon’s campus and programs must be maintained and communicated

Question Two: We have had great success with our Elon Experiences: study abroad, leadership, service learning, undergraduate research and internships. What would you recommend as the next level of quality in this area? Should we add another experience, and if so, what would it be? Or are there ways we should deepen the existing experiences?

Improve consistency/quality of our internships and experiences by evaluating and changing as needed
Have students put together a plan for what they hope to experience
Include as an objective helping students with a self discovery process by assessing the student fully over four years
Make the experiences more effective and of better quality rather than adding another experience

Question Three: A premier program of international education and top-rated pre-medical and pre-law programs have been suggested as prime foci for “deepening”? What other examples can you suggest and defend?

Information Technology - an unmet need?
Health care? Growth of elderly population?
Finance-global considerations
Light manufacturing? Engineering or production/operations concentration in business school

Question Four: On the budget valves: How concerned should we be about enrollment growth? How much elasticity is there in our cost? How do we find the right price point?

Control growth so as to preserve the Elon ambiance
Don’t let admissions rely solely on the numbers
Problem: Increasing costs vs. lack of diversity
Need for increasing endowment
Should be seen as affordable

Question Five: Elon plans to build new housing and dining facilities in order further develop the residential character of the campus by issues additional debt or other alternative financing. Other capital projects include the Academic Village Pavilion, etc. How would you advise the president about balancing facilities and endowment needs?

The dining and residential areas are self-funding. The other capital buildings were met by the group with skepticism as it is difficult to grow the endowment and meet the physical needs of the university at the same time. Gerald Whittington is doing a superb job finding the right balance of financing to keep the university growing. The alumni base of 54% under the age of 40 means there is a large group of alums without much money yet. We do have 30% of our alums giving, but some other schools have a higher percentage. This idea of giving needs to be promoted beginning in students' freshman year. They do feel the University has achieved the feeling of “Arriving,” therefore it may be easier to fund the endowment, and other fundraising projects will become easier in the future.

What are peer and aspirant schools?

Peer

Samford
Drake
Mercer
Davidson
Furman
Emory
Rollins
Wofford
Ithaca
Richmond
William and Mary
Miami of Ohio
Lehigh
College of Charleston

Aspirant

Richmond
Rice
Davidson
Wake Forest
Dartmouth
American
Princeton
Duke
Middlebury