In fiscal 2009, UNC Chapel Hill's endowment lost nearly 20 percent of its value. In real numbers, that's $440 million, from $2.2 billion to about $1.8 billion.

"That's a painful, significant loss," John King, of the UNC Management Co., told campus trustees this week. "It's something we'll be dealing with for a while."

Though tough to stomach, the endowment loss is not unusual. Universities everywhere have struggled this year with significant decreases in the value of their endowments. A study by Cambridge Associates shows that the average loss in fiscal 09 by a group of 163 colleges and universities is 20 percent - so UNC-CH is right at the average.

"Fiscal 09 was the worst college endowment year in decades - I'd even say years," King told trustees. "It's going to take a lot of time to repair the damage that occurred last year."

For more on the university's annual endowment fund report, click the document attached to this blog post.

Documents:

Don't like today's decision by trustees at UNC Chapel Hill to increase tuition and fees?

Try going to UCLA.

 At Carolina, trustees approved a plan today that would raise tuition and fees for in-state students by 5.2 percent.

At UCLA, all you-know-what is breaking loose as that campus ponders a 32 percent increase to its sticker price.

Yes, 32 percent.

Read more here.

At UNC Chapel Hill, trustees have signed off on a tuition and fee increase package for the next academic year.

The plan, which will now be submitted to the UNC system's Board of Governors, raises tuition $200 for in-state students. Out-of-state undergrads would get a $1,127 rate hike, while out-of-state grad students would pay $732 more in 2010-11.   Fees would go up $96.01 for all students.

Under the plan, in-state undergraduate students would pay $5,921.42 in tuition and fees next year, and out-of-staters would pay $24,736.42.

Those numbers do not include room, board, books and other expenses.

There's a catch to all this. The 2009 General Assembly has already set rates for 2010-11 that will raise in-state tuition $200 or 8 percent, whichever is less. That decision trumps anything on the campus or UNC-system level.

So the tuition rates the UNC-CH campus trustees approved today include that $200 increase for in-state students.

But last UNC system President Erskine Bowles said recently that legislative leaders  are willing to listen to alternate proposals.

If the General Assembly's edict holds, all tuition revenue raised would go into the state's general fund. If it decides next year to adopt a university tuition plan instead, revenue raised would be used for campus needs, and half of it would be set aside for financial aid.

Campus officials would very much like to keep that $200 that the General Assembly has targeted for the General Fund.

The increase for nonresident students has created some discontent, but campus and UNC-system leaders have long viewed those students differently than North Carolinians. Tuition for out-of-state students has often been set with market and competitiveness data used as guidelines.

Ryan Morgan, a UNC-CH student representing 5,000 other non-resident students, told trustees prior to Thursday's vote that the cost of an out-of-state education is forcing some students to withdraw.

"I myself am graduating one year early because I can't afford to stay here an additional year," said Morgan, who is from Alabama. "Out-of-state students are imperative to the quality of the university. What good is the best university in the country if you can't afford it?"

Read more on this issue in Friday's News & Observer.

This semester, N.C. Central University had such an enrollment surge that they had to put about 300 students in a local hotel.

There are still about 100 students living in the Millennium Hotel, but the lease with the university expires in December, officials said today.

All those students will live on campus next semester, campus leaders said today during a board of trustee meeting.

Here's the background.

John Grisham, author of 23 books including numerous best-selling legal thrillers, will deliver UNC-Chapel Hill's spring commencement address.

Chancellor Holden Thorp will preside at the ceremony on May 9 at 9:30 a.m. in Kenan Stadium.

Grisham's daughter, Shea,graduated from UNC-CH last year with a degree in elementary education and teaches in Raleigh.

“John is an engaging speaker who will have a profound message for our graduates and their families,” Thorp said in a news release. “His prowess with the written and spoken word makes him an excellent choice for a commencement speaker.  He has an inspirational story to share.”

Thorp chose Grisham in consultation with the University’s Commencement Speaker Selection Committee, which is made up of an equal number of students and faculty.

The author spoke at two North Carolina Literary Festivals held on campus, in 1998 and the most recent festival in September. 

Grisham’s last book, "Ford County," was published on Nov. 3 and is his first collection of short stories. "The Innocent Man," published in 2006, was his first work of non-fiction. Nine of his books have been made into movies.

For much of the decade, N.C. Central University flung its doors wide open, welcoming scores of new students - prompted by a UNC system mandate to increase enrollment.

Problem was, those students weren't all ready for college. Plenty dropped out, leaving NCCU with a stain on its graduation rate data. From 2004 to 2008, just 18 percent of NCCU students graduated within four years. About 38 percent managed in five years, and about half did it in six years.

Now, university leaders are re-making the undergraduate academic experience, shifting from the enrollment model from quantity to quality. They're slowing the enrollment growth, a move necessary in part because the campus infrastructure can't withstand continued expansion, and looking for ways to admit better students.

UNC Chapel Hill's hiring of a corporate efficiency consultant last year was, at first, controversial on campus.

The on-campus furor over the hire, which was funded by an anonymous donor, seems to have subsided, and now the university is getting some good publicity for the move.

First, other big-name universities, like Cornell and Berkeley, followed Carolina's lead. And now, the New York Times has chimed in with a story noting, as the Times likes to do, a  trend in the making: universities turning to private consultants to look for cost savings.

Here's the story.

Just ran across this interesting tidbit in the Chronicle of Higher Education that gives some insight into German culture.

At German universities, classes actually start 15 minutes later than their noted start times.

It's called the 'academic quarter hour,' and is a routine everyone there follows.

If your class says 11 a.m., it actually starts at 11:15, so don't be alarmed if you get there at the top of the hour and you're alone in the classroom.

Here's the story.

Erskine Bowles will tell you: He's no marketing genius.

But in his role as the president of the UNC system, he is a pitchman of sorts. He has a product and he has to sell it - to taxpayers, to legislators, to students and their parents.

And now, he wants to raise his game.

In remarks Friday during a meeting of the UNC system's Board of Governors, Bowles spoke of recent meetings with legislators. He said those lawmakers were surprised, and pleasantly so, to hear about the long list of projects and goals Bowles and his staff have put together for the current year.

So Bowles now wants to tell the university's success stories more often.

To that end, Bowles now plans on monthly progress reports on big university initiatives to be distributed to lawmakers. He wants to demonstrate that projects funded by taxpayers are underway and doing what they're supposed to be doing.

"I haven't done as good a job as I should do to get the positive messages out," he said. "We have a job to protect the reputation of this critically important jewel. I've got to do a better job of that. I think we all do."

Each month during board meetings, Bowles runs down a list of accomplishments and notable achievements by UNC system campuses, faculty, staff and students.

A few from the last month:

* North Carolina A & T and UNC Greensboro broke ground on a new, joint nanoscience and nanoengineering school that will emphasize research and commercialization of products generated there.

For Greensboro residents, this new project represents economic hope, Bowles said Friday.
"They've lost textiles and apparel and furniture," he said. "This is a chance for new industry."

* The marching bands from N.C. Central University and Western Carolina were each selected for the Tournament of Roses, the big New Year's Day parade in Pasadena. Only 13 bands were selected.

* N.C. State celebrated the 25th anniversary of Centennial Campus, a public/private research venture that has served as a model for other similar ventures.

* A 2003 NCSU alum, Doc Hendley, has been recognized by CNN for a non-profit organization he set up that builds and sanitizes water wells in developing countries.

It's a long and winding road to Division I athletics with all manner of obstacle along the way.

It's expensive. It's complicated. Did I mention it's expensive?

In North Carolina, two public, historically black universities have spent the last five years or so trying to make the big jump.

One, N.C. Central University in Durham, appears poised for a successful transition.

Another, Winston-Salem State University, has run aground in its quest for big-time athletics glory.

Read on.