Moving Toward Sustainable Business Models for the Academic Portfolio

Society for College and University Planning

Mid-Atlantic 2022 Regional Conference | South Meeting Room | Newcomb Hall

Presented by: Katie Hagan, Principal, rpk GROUP | Nicole Woods, Chief of Staff, University of Virginia | Tammy McHale, Senior Associate Dean for Administration and Planning, University of Virginia

The pandemic has accelerated existing challenges to higher education’s business model. In order to create more sustainable models, we will need to ask hard questions regarding our academic portfolios. Using the University of Virginia’s (UVA) College of Arts and Sciences as an example, we will discuss emerging best practices for creating academic portfolios that serve both an institution’s mission and market. This session will empower you to put this best practice to use and begin the difficult work of analyzing your institution’s academic portfolio.

The rpk team is excited to announce a new webinar on Pandemic Relief Funding: Using HEERF for Strategic Investments. rpk GROUP has engaged with more than 80 institutions as they explore ways to strategically utilize their institutional Higher Education Emergency Relief Fund (HEERF) allocations. This webinar will be led by Rick Staisloff, Donna Desrochers and Katie Hagan.

Sign up to learn more about:

• The three funding Acts and student & institutional funding streams
• Appropriate and disallowable uses of institutional funds and spending timelines
• A framework for strategically investing in academic and student success within HEERF parameters
• Examples surfaced from the field around best practice for strategic investing of institutional funds.
• Adopting an ROI approach at your own institution, with an emphasis on moving successfully from survival to recovery to sustainability post-pandemic.

Learn more and sign up here. 

rpk GROUP’s Donna Desrochers joins fellow presenters Michael Daly, Carrie Fishner, Michell eBeechey and Cori Wilhelm for a 50-minute virtual session. You’ll hear insights from a large-scale, multi-year, multi-campus sustainability effort in SUNY.

Presenters will share from their experiences creating and supporting adoption of the SUNY OER Sustainability Framework, including the facilitation of peer support cohorts, where campuses guide each other in the adoption of sustainability policies and practices.

This session is part of the fourth annual Northeast Regional OER Summit, running virtually through University of Massachusetts Amherst from May 24-26. A multi-state collaborative virtual event for new and experienced OER advocates, the summit offers the opportunity to learn and share effective practices in awareness building, implementation, collaboration, strategy, and research.

Prior to the pandemic, most academic institutions were wrestling with a disconnect between their program offerings and student/employer demand, as well a lack of understand around academic portfolio ROI. As a result, academic portfolios were often financially unsustainable.

In 2020, rpk completed a full academic portfolio and efficiency analysis, plus capacity building workshops for academic leadership and faculty at Howard Community College.

In this upcoming AACC Digital session, our senior partner Rick Staisloff and Howard Community College president Dr. Kate Hetherington will share the approach, analysis and results from their 2020 academic portfolio review.

What’s involved in a full academic portfolio and efficiency analysis? How can capacity building workshops help faculty?

If you’re curious about these services and how related challenges get resolved, you’ll want to join in this ‘bite-sized’ session.

This workshop series is part of our continuing partnership with ACE, it will be led by Rick Staisloff, Donna Desrochers and Katie Hagan, and will be offered on the ACE Engage®​ peer-to-peer learning platform.

The workshop series supports a new Strategic Finance microcredential issued as an open digital badge⁠, which can be added to your CV, LinkedIn profile, and Credly Acclaim platform.

​​​Sign up for the series if you need to:

• Understand the shift from traditional approaches to resource allocation to a return-on-investment (ROI) lens
• Be able to identify the components of ROI
• Be familiar with best practices in the field for creating sustainable business models
• Get peer and expert feedback on action plans for adopting an ROI approach at your own institution, with an emphasis on moving successfully from survival to recovery to sustainability post-pandemic

Session 4: ROI in Action

This workshop series is part of our continuing partnership with ACE, it will be led by Rick Staisloff, Donna Desrochers and Katie Hagan, and will be offered on the ACE Engage®​ peer-to-peer learning platform.

The workshop series supports a new Strategic Finance microcredential issued as an open digital badge⁠, which can be added to your CV, LinkedIn profile, and Credly Acclaim platform.

​​​Sign up for the series if you need to:

• Understand the shift from traditional approaches to resource allocation to a return-on-investment (ROI) lens
• Be able to identify the components of ROI
• Be familiar with best practices in the field for creating sustainable business models
• Get peer and expert feedback on action plans for adopting an ROI approach at your own institution, with an emphasis on moving successfully from survival to recovery to sustainability post-pandemic

Session 3: Creating an ROI Action Plan

This workshop series is part of our continuing partnership with ACE, it will be led by Rick Staisloff, Donna Desrochers and Katie Hagan, and will be offered on the ACE Engage®​ peer-to-peer learning platform.

The workshop series supports a new Strategic Finance microcredential issued as an open digital badge⁠, which can be added to your CV, LinkedIn profile, and Credly Acclaim platform.

​​​Sign up for the series if you need to:

• Understand the shift from traditional approaches to resource allocation to a return-on-investment (ROI) lens
• Be able to identify the components of ROI
• Be familiar with best practices in the field for creating sustainable business models
• Get peer and expert feedback on action plans for adopting an ROI approach at your own institution, with an emphasis on moving successfully from survival to recovery to sustainability post-pandemic

Session 1: Moving from Spending to an ROI Lens

In this session, we introduce the shift from traditional budget models focused on spending to a new approach based on return on investment (ROI). Participants will explore how the ROI approach better responds to changes in the external environment.

Special guest: Jon Turk, director of research at ACE, will share new Pulse Point survey findings on the biggest financial pressures colleges and universities are facing.

Session Activity

• Participants will debate the following: 1) Is higher education ready to adopt an ROI lens?; 2) How different is the ROI approach?; 3) What would change at your institution as the result of a shift to an ROI approach?
• Participants will also capture what they consider to be the top three best practices when shifting to an ROI lens. ​

During this virtual session at EACUBO’s spring workshop, Rick Staisloff will be joined by Melissa Beardmore, CFO at our long-time partner Anne Arundel Community College. Melissa will share from AACC’s experience conducting a full administrative services review with rpk. That work resulted in the capture of savings equal to 5% of AACC’s annual operating budget—allowing for reinvestment in the college’s post-pandemic transformation efforts.

Budgeting at higher education institutions is largely based on historical allocations, with little connection to strategy. As a result, many institutions find themselves with unsustainable business models. This session will share how institutions can shift to a return-on-investment framework, allowing them to reallocate toward a new shared future vision and create a business model that is sustainable in the long run. The session will feature recent case study examples of academic portfolio and administrative services restructurings that positioned institutions to emerge strongly from the pandemic.