Category: Blog

There have been several stories in the news lately about colleges with growing enrollments that are planning for campus expansion (including Loyola and New York University), and these stories have highlighted both the importance and challenges of strong town-gown relations during the capital planning process. We asked Mark Beck, director of capital planning at the University System of Maryland for insights into how institutions can more effectively invite town participation in a campus expansion planning effort. Engage Your Community Early and Often “It’s not so much what you do to engage your community, but how you do it.”Mark Beck, U System of Maryland The most important investment you can make is to engage your community as often as possible. Beck suggests that you can’t simply go through the motion of holding meetings and communicating via the web and newsletters. You have to actually listen and engage your community in the planning process. He points to examples of public meetings that he convened early in his career that weren’t successful because the university approached the discussion as an announcement of their plans rather than as a listening opportunity. Beck suggests making the meetings more regular, less formal, and more focused on dialogue. Equally […]

A recent feature in The Chronicle detailed how as funds for facilities decrease, more colleges are signing performance contracts with energy services companies (ESCOs); often, an experienced ESCO can implement much needed infrastructure improvements and efficiency projects that are then paid for by energy savings. However, the Chronicle notes several cases in which poorly structured partnerships led to long negotiations late in the project or even litigation, and quotes one expert, the president of Synchronous Energy Solutions, as remarking, “If you’re going to try to fix everything at the end, it’s a lost cause for everyone — the ESCO and the owner.” We turned to Bruce Colburn, chief operating officer at EPS Capital Corp., who has both taken part on many college review committees selecting ESCOs and served at an ESCO, for advice on how colleges can set up a successful partnership from the beginning — including what to consider in the RFP, the selection process, and the contract. The Right RFP “Don’t write an RFP asking for a book or a three-ring binder full of information. Too much information is as bad as too little.”Bruce Colburn, EPS Capital Corp Nor will it be useful to review an overwhelming list […]

Recent news has been rife with stories of information technology budgets slashed, and of chief information officers needing to make quick decisions around cuts and resource reallocation. Most recently, Campus Technology reported — in a dramatically titled article, “Campus IT Under the Knife” — that the University of Illinois, owed $431 million by the state government, has asked its chief information officer to cut $30 million from an IT budget that has already been frozen for the past 5 years. In a climate of such urgent cost containment, IT expenditures are frequently one place that institutional leaders look to for savings. We asked Shah Ardalan, vice chancellor of technology services and CIO for the Lone Star College System, who has built a reputation for savvy IT budget management, for his advice on how IT leaders can take a strategic look at costs and resource allocation during an ongoing budget crisis. Interview with Shah Ardalan AI: How can the CIO best revisit resource allocation and determine the right “blend” of cuts? Ardalan: These are the best times to recheck priorities against the organization’s values and strategies.  Based on the current economic challenges, many strategies changed which should result in project reprioritization.  Protecting true […]