logo
    • Magazine
    • Membership
    • Donate
  • Racial Justice
  • Economic Justice
    • Collections
  • Climate Justice
  • Health Justice
  • Leadership
  • CONTENT TYPES
  • Subscribe
  • Webinars
    • Upcoming Webinars
    • Complimentary Webinars
    • Premium On-Demand Webinars
  • Membership
  • Submissions

The Case of the Disappearing Scholarships

Marian Conway
May 15, 2018
Share
Tweet
Share
Email
Print

May 11, 2018; Washington Post

Approximately 60 students from Nepal have been told their full scholarships to the University of Texas at Tyler have been withdrawn. UT-Tyler blames the recall on offering too many scholarships for the available funds.

This notice comes late in the school year, at a point when high school seniors have often made their college choices. Students all the way in South Asia are scrambling to make up the $10,000 left after the school offered to charge them the in-state resident tuition rate and provide $5,000 in merit scholarships. (Full tuition for out-of-state students is $27,000.) It is not clear how the $1.7 million error went unnoticed before the confirmation letters went out to the students.

Other schools have stepped up to provide some slots, but it is so late in the process that universities are working with their waitlists, as incoming classes have received their own acceptance letters and enrollment paperwork. The Chronicle of Higher Education reported that there have been firm offers of full scholarships for two students at Texas Christian University and one student at the South Korea campus of the State University of New York.

Sign up for our free newsletters

Subscribe to NPQ's newsletters to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.

UT-Tyler is located in East Texas, has 10,000 students and is part of a university system consisting of seven campuses and six health institutions. UT-Tyler does have an affiliated foundation that supports the school, but it cannot help with the 60 scholarships since their endowment is just under $3 million, spending only $122,000 last year. A University of Texas System spokesperson, Karen Adler, provided a statement explaining that the system cannot step in to fund the 60 international students for UT-Tyler because as “an administrative organization, we do not have instructional funds for scholarships.”

“The UT System Administration has been continuously and fully briefed by UT-Tyler and is assured by [UT-Tyler] President Michael Tidwell that significant changes to admissions and operational processes have been remedied to ensure this situation never occurs again,” the statement said.

Tidwell called the $1.7 million hole “a very unfortunate learning situation for us.” Jim Jump, former president of the National Association for College Admission Counseling, wrote in Inside Higher Ed, “I’ve been writing about the ethics of college admission for a long time. There are a number of practices I find troubling, even sketchy, but I don’t ever remember an ethical imbroglio this big or this bad.”

Errors, bad investments, and even malfeasance seem to be plaguing academic organizations and their affiliated foundations. An egregious mistake that affects the lives of 60 individuals at another university level adds to concerns that there’s a serious lack of oversight for the bottom line in academia.—Marian Conway

Share
Tweet
Share
Email
Print
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Marian Conway

Marian Conway, the executive director of the NY Community Bank Foundation, has a Masters in Interdisciplinary Studies, Writing and a Ph.D. in Public Policy, Nonprofit Management. She has discovered that her job and education have made her a popular person with nonprofits and a prime candidate for their boards. Marian keeps things in perspective, not allowing all that to go to her head, but it is difficult to say no to a challenge, especially participating in change, in remaking a board. She is currently on eleven boards of various sizes and has learned to say no.

More about: colleges and universitiesManagement and LeadershipNonprofit News

Become a member

Support independent journalism and knowledge creation for civil society. Become a member of Nonprofit Quarterly.

Members receive unlimited access to our archived and upcoming digital content. NPQ is the leading journal in the nonprofit sector written by social change experts. Gain access to our exclusive library of online courses led by thought leaders and educators providing contextualized information to help nonprofit practitioners make sense of changing conditions and improve infra-structure in their organizations.

Join Today
logo logo logo logo logo
See comments

NPQ_Winter_2022Subscribe Today
You might also like
Hierarchy and Justice
Cyndi Suarez
Salvadoran Foreign Agent Law Threatens Human Rights Movements
Devon Kearney
Charitable Tax Reform: Why Half Measures Won’t Curb Plutocracy
Alan Davis
Healing-Centered Leadership: A Path to Transformation
Shawn A. Ginwright
Into the Fire: Lessons from Movement Conflicts
Ingrid Benedict, Weyam Ghadbian and Jovida Ross
How Nonprofits Can Truly Advance Change
Hildy Gottlieb

Popular Webinars

Remaking the Economy

Black Food Sovereignty, Community Stories

Register Now

Combating Disinformation and Misinformation in 21st-Century Social Movements

Register Now

Remaking the Economy

Closing the Racial Wealth Gap

Register Now
You might also like
Hierarchy and Justice
Cyndi Suarez
Salvadoran Foreign Agent Law Threatens Human Rights...
Devon Kearney
Charitable Tax Reform: Why Half Measures Won’t Curb...
Alan Davis

Like what you see?

Subscribe to the NPQ newsletter to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

See our newsletters

By signing up, you agree to our privacy policy and terms of use, and to receive messages from NPQ and our partners.

Independent & in your mailbox.

Subscribe today and get a full year of NPQ for just $59.

subscribe
  • About
  • Contact
  • Advertise
  • Copyright
  • Careers

We are using cookies to give you the best experience on our website.

 

Non Profit News | Nonprofit Quarterly
Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.