INFORMATION FOR PARENTS

Endowments are funds meant to be used in times of crisis, yet with an almost $1billion endowment, Oberlin refuses to use it. Meanwhile, the college implements crisis-level austerity programs that include the firing of 108 workers, outsourcing of all dining and sanitation work, outsourcing of student jobs within campus dining services, hiking the price of OSCA, cutting from disability services and the MRC, hiring fewer RAs with few benefits, failing to provide safe and accommodating living spaces for students, limits on hiring professors, and more.

Oberlin invests 64% of the endowment money into opaque alternative investments, “expensive, secretive, unregulated, illiquid, risky, and hard-to-value financial instruments.” No information about the specifics of Oberlin’s investments is public. The college claims to spend approximately $3 Million a year on investment management, but financial experts estimate the real cost (due to fees and contracts) is upwards of $15 Million. (Meanwhile, the college claims that it will save only $2 Million per year by outsourcing housing and dining services and busting the dining worker’s union). The college is completely opaque about the returns on these investments, leaving us in the dark about whether money being shoveled into Wall Street’s pockets is even coming back to Oberlin at all.

The college’s decisions are more informed by the opinions of a rating agency than the needs of its own students. The college’s rating affects Oberlin’s ability to get loans, which is how the college spends money for the annual budget. Moody’s opinion of austerity measures favors the college’s aggressive austerity measures. 

This process is happening everywhere in higher education. Approximately 650,000 people lost their jobs at higher education institutions in 2020 alone, most of them on the lower pay scale. 

Oberlin, in order to increase their revenue and combat covid-caused low attendance rates, has increased their enrollment and permitted nearly 900 freshmen. This is over enrollment, which contributes to long lines, limited housing, limited food, and overflowing trash that hurts your child's college experience.

Oberlin has also made it increasingly difficult for the Oberlin Student Cooperative Association (OSCA) to function. They have cut out two co-ops and raised the rent for all the others. The college has refused to clean co-ops effectively, repair buildings, or heat students’ rooms. This means if your child wants to live in a more community-based model, cut their food costs, or enter a more food-secure situation, the option is no longer available.

To try and cut costs, Oberlin has refused to hire more tenure-track professors, only bringing in visiting and adjunct professors. This makes it much more difficult for professors to be secure in their jobs, but also hurts your child’s education and college experience.

Oberlin has outsourced work for all campus dining and sanitation work. This not only means that your child’s options to work at the college have diminished, but also that (because these private companies are understaffed) there are long lines at dining halls and trash piles up around campus. Understaffing in AVI has led to long lines, overworked employees (both student and full-time workers), lack of access to food, insufficient dietary restriction accommodations.

Housing is in disrepair including 3-foot holes in the bathroom ceiling (in Hark), black mold in the vents in Village housing and the Firelands, rotting doors in Keep, failure to clean dorms, mold in the showers, and overflowing trash cans, all because the school wants to save a dollar on labor and cleaning supplies. 

Austerity has also led the college to price gouging: for the least expensive meal plan you can purchase for your child, each meal costs about $20 for you, but costs the college about $8 worth of food. For the least expensive meal plan, you pay about $11 per meal. One cup o’ ramen, sold for $1 at the gas station, is $5 at DeCafe’.