Capital Area Antiochians

Antioch’s president and Jera Oliver, director of major gifts, hosted a small group of alumni for lunch in an office conference room provided by John Capozzi. The informal discussion, assisted by two local interpreters for Jane, touched on enrollment, curriculum, the co-op program, graduate employment, finances, fundraising, and property sales. Jane was characteristically upbeat. Some highlights:

• Antioch enrolled 20 new students this winter—a record for mid-year admissions. The college aims to raise total enrollment to 175 by this fall.
• Overall retention is close to a college goal of 75 percent. First-year retention is now 88 percent. Antioch’s six-year graduation rate has improved by 66 percent.
• All of the 2025 graduating class were employed right away. None went immediately on to graduate school. In a survey, 90 percent of graduates reported satisfaction with the college. (Left unclear was whether the survey went just to 2025 graduates or covered more years.) 
• Co-op, and allowing students to gain work experience, as well as four or five supervisor references, “is one of the great things we have.” An Antioch education is half liberal arts and half coop—work and international experiences. “We are focusing on work that people will love” that allows them to “find out who they are.”
• Antioch plans to issue stand-alone practitioner certificates for farm-related courses in eco-farming and food foresting.
• “My biggest qualm” is that each year the college is not bringing in enough money from students, and can’t replenish the endowment sufficiently. She favors reaching out to schools where parents can afford to contribute more in tuition. “We need a way to get more money in the door.”
• Antioch’s 175th Anniversary fundraising campaign is serving to raise the brand and knowledge of Antioch.
• There is one pending property deal: Antioch’s sale of the Kettering Building at 150 East South College Street to the Windsor Companies, a Columbus-area developer, is awaiting approval by Yellow Springs Village. If and when that happens, Antioch would receive $700.000. After Kettering, there are no plans for further property sales. (The Dayton Daily News reported that Windsor plans to renovate the existing Kettering structure as a 43-unit apartment complex. Windsor bought the derelict Antioch student union for $500,000 last summer, intending to build a 96-unit apartment complex, according to the Yellow Springs News.) After Kettering, there are no plans for further property sales.
• While Antioch’s strong work emphasis fits the Trump Education Department’s demands that higher education yield positive financial outcomes for students, Jane sounded uneasy about proposals to turn that philosophy into regulations. The ED is developing rules that apply an earnings test to all programs. This may get complicated in assessing Antioch’s “design your major” offering of five “academic pathways”—interdisciplinary arts and creative practice; culture, power, and change; global studies and engagement; social enterprise and social innovation; and sustainability and the environment. An ED press release says institutions that fail to meet certain earnings thresholds face the loss of access to the direct loan program. “Failing programs” could lose Pell grant eligibility.
• Jane was asked about the most recent audit, but her response was not very clear.