Avila College president Tom Gordon suggests the school's objective is to integrate IT while protecting exceptional student-professor interaction.
All schools are trying to figure out what role the Internet will play in the future of higher learning. "One of the challenges of private education is how to interweave the advances of technology with the personal and individual interaction of professor and student, which is the hallmark of private education,"says Thomas Gordon, president of Avila College. Park University appears to have met the challenge. Its 34 campuses act as feeders into Park's Internet distance learning program, which has exploded to the point that the university now provides 10 percent of all Internet education in the United States. Because it has found and filled this niche, Gault says, "Park is in the strongest financial condition of its 126 years."

Of all the challenges facing independent institutions today, "the greatest challenge is financial," says Gordon. "The high cost of technology and competitive salaries place a strain on a budget where tuition, gifts, and grants are the only revenue sources." John Darling, interim dean of the school of management at Rockhurst University concurs. "As it has been for many years," Darling says, "funding is the greatest challenge facing private colleges and universities today. Private institutions are typically very tuition-driven with regard to their funding base."

According to the U.S. Department of Education, the price of education for the 1999-2000 academic year averaged $3,356 for public schools. For private institutions, it averaged $15,380. It's an area where private colleges and universities struggle to stay competitive, especially as the consumers of all education have seen prices soar. Between 1987 and 1996, expenditures per full-time-equivalent student rose, after adjusting for inflation, by nine percent. Tuition costs have risen at a rate of nearly eight times the rate of income over the last 20 years.

John Neal, president of Ottawa University, says private schools must remain "nimble" in such a highly competitive educational environment, and this includes serving an increasing spectrum of demands. Extending beyond the core curriculum presents its own challenges, however. Carey of Benedictine says the greatest challenge for any school is to be clear about its mission. Lambert of Baker says it is to maintain the distinctive character of the institution.
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