With a little more than 30 alumni in attendance, Jim Piatt, Senior Vice President for Advancement and External Affairs and co-chair of the Elon University and Queens University merger sprint team, held a listening session for alumni on Oct. 10 in LaRose Commons 200.
The session was part of Elon's Homecoming weekend activities and was a way for alumni to learn more information about the merger and voice their opinions about it.
Piatt began by telling alumni about the main details of the merger and recent developments. Piatt told them that there is still a lot of work to be done, but that next steps involve assuming governance of Queens by Aug. 1, 2026. He also said that Elon will then make an application to the Department of Education, after they assume governance, which could be a 12- to 18-month process.
Alumni asked a variety of questions to Piatt and a few representatives from the sprint team that were present. Alums were concerned about graduate programs in Greensboro being moved down to Charlotte, but Associate Provost for Academic Affairs and sprint team member Jennifer Platania said there is no plan for all of the graduate programs to move from the “main campus.”
Alums also inquired about whether professors will have to move between campuses. Piatt responded by saying that they are planning not to at this point.
Alums also asked about the financial help that is being provided to Queens. In the 2023 fiscal year, Queens lost $20 million. Since the pandemic, the university has been drawing from its endowment to make up for losses.
Piatt, however, said that Queens’ financial health was fine.
“There's no crisis here. Nobody's in crisis,” Piatt said. “They've had some enrollment struggles, and that translates to some financial challenges, for sure, in their more recent history. But, I think, in terms of their bond rating and all the things that you would point to for financial health or ratios, they're in fine shape.”
Jack Duval ‘93, who created a website with other alums against the merger, brought up Queens’ financial struggles in response to Piatt.
“You'll see they're running an $8.7 million operating deficit right now. It's worse than that if you look at all their operations, but it's about $8.7 million a year right now,” Duval said during the session.
Alumni also asked about the impact on athletics. Steve Roach, Deputy Director of Athletics and a member of the sprint team, said that Queens and Elon’s athletics programs will act as two separate entities as they go forward.
“Right now, the focus at Elon has been, to our coaching staff, we're focusing on Elon,” Roach said. “Our focus remains, athletically, strictly on our student athletes and their experience.”
Roach said there is no precedent for two private universities at a Division I level merging.
An alum also asked about whether Queens would be changing their name at all. Piatt said that Elon has promised to retain the Queens name and honor its history, but that there could be some changes. According to Piatt, Elon is working with a Charlotte-based public relations firm to test potential names for Queens. He said that potential names could maybe be “Elon University, Queens Campus” or “Elon University, Queens College.”
Piatt was also asked about whether Queens students will have to move to Elon’s campus. Piatt said that current Queens students will finish at Queens, but for the future, it’s to be determined.
Alumni also asked whether there is opportunity for land development on Queens campus but Piatt said that most of the campus is being used up. An alum also brought up that this merger could bring a big change to students because Queens students are required to live on campus all four years, compared to Elon’s two year requirement.
Duval said that his criticism of the merger goes beyond just the merger.
“Elon has, in some ways, lost its way, and I believe that that's now showing up in the enrollment numbers,” Duval said. “We're down 18% in the past two years, 11% last year, 7% the year before. This is a huge problem for this institution. Why? Because we are tuition driven, right? We don't have a multi billion dollar endowment. We pay the bills with tuition.”
Duval also brought up the fact that this decrease in enrollment comes at a time when other North Carolina universities are seeing an increase in enrollment. The University of North Carolina System saw an increase in enrollment by 3.4% this year. Duval thinks Elon has “taken the eye off the ball.”
“We've gotten distracted,” Duval said. “The administration has gotten distracted from the core mission, the undergraduate mission. That's what we're really all about. Undergraduate excellence, experiential learning, all those things. We've embraced a bunch of educational fads. We have these campuses all over the place. Now we're doing graduate programs. That's not the core mission.”
Duval believes that the only way that the merger makes sense is if Elon shuts down the undergraduate program at Queens and makes the merger about real estate. However, Duval said that no one will trust Elon after this and that it will destroy their reputation.
“If it doesn't work, then Elon will sustain serious reputational damage, it'll be a clown show, ‘these guys merged with the school, and they all fell apart, and now it's being sold off,’” Duval said. “Nobody does this. Think about it. If merging was the solution in the way you achieved greatness as a university, Harvard would have 100 of them, right?”