Survival of the fittest

A brief interview on the present crisis with Kevin J. Matthews, vice president of the Boston Chapter and CEO of The Registry executive search firm for colleges and universities:

What general hiring trends are you seeing at the college level attributable to the financial impact of the pandemic?

There are many hiring freezes going on, and most low-to-mid-level vacancies are being filled internally. Many institutions have been furloughing employees or even letting employees go.

However, we are seeing that many high-level vacancies are being filled with interim administrators because of reluctance by boards and presidents to hire executives using only Zoom technology to “meet” their candidates. It feels less risky utilizing an outside interim during this period of uncertainty.

How big a role will tuition costs play in the survival of colleges in coming years?

Public institutions will enjoy an advantage over the small private liberal arts college that have middle-of-the-road reputations. The price differential will be a significant factor in the closing of the privates over the next few years. They will not enjoy enough distinctiveness to convince the consumers to pay the higher tuition. And many of these smaller privates do not have large endowments or strong balance sheets sufficient enough to weather these hard times.

What, if any, lasting change will this pandemic bring to higher education?

The COVID-19 experience for colleges and universities has finally provided proof that they need to develop rigorous and attractive on-line learning capacity. For many institutions this proof has flown in the face of what has been historic reluctance of the faculty to embrace this “new” methodology of teaching and learning. The absolute need for this has provided the impetus to drive the acceptance of this new way of teaching. The worry will be that it comes too late to save these institutions.