Vicious Circle

For most college presidents, the topic under discussion--industrial and foundation aid to higher education--would have been a heartening one. But the more President K. Duane Hurley of West Virginia's little (306 full-time students) Salem College heard at the meeting of fellow presidents one day last summer, the more depressed he became. "For two days," said he, "I listened to reports about trie Ford Foundation and what it expected to do, about the National Merit Scholarship program, the Sears Roebuck scholarship plan and similar ones." Yet for all these benefactions, Salem remained completely ineligible. Reason: like 114 other nontax-supported, liberal arts campuses across the U.S., it is not regionally accredited.

Last week Duane Hurley was at the head of a new crusade to solve the curious problem confronting these non-accredited campuses. As chairman of a group tentatively called the Fund for the Forgotten Colleges, he has made a survey of his fellow sufferers, found that many of them are facing the same dilemma. Rarely will a corporation or foundation give money to a nonaccredited college, but without that money, the college usually cannot meet the standards of its regional association. "It would seem," says Hurley, "like a vicious circle. You need accreditation to get money, and money to get accreditation." Examples of campuses caught in the circle:

P: Eureka (Ill.) College, founded in 1855 by the elders of the local Disciples of Christ, was the victim of the Depression. In spite of every economy, it could not afford to keep up its library or replace its retiring professors. It even had to pay part of its faculty in scrip. In 1936 the North Central Association finally withdrew its accreditation. Today, reports President Ira W. Langston, the yearly deficit is still $20,000, and though the library is climbing up to par and the college has about the proper proportion of Ph.D.'s on its faculty, it cannot approach the association until Langston balances his budget. But where will the money come from? One corporation recently with drew a promised gift of $12,500 because Eureka was not accredited. The Ford Foundation's big ($260 million) windfall specifically excluded nonregionally accredited campuses.

P: Like Eureka, 129-year-old Shurtleff College in Alton, Ill. lost its accreditation m 1936. This, says President Roland E. Turnbull, "is something like not having a union label on your product, or the approval seal of the fire underwriters." A Shurtleff coed cannot join a national sorority or be a member of the American Association of University Women. Even worse, the college has already had to resign from the fund-raising Associated Colleges of Illinois. Yet Baptist Shurtleff has managed to make considerable contribution over the years. Among its alumni four college presidents, 112 college and university teachers, 240 Baptist ministers, 30% of the public school teachers in Alton.

P: When 100-year-old Wilberforce (Ohio) University tried to win back its accreditation in 1950, it met all academic requirements, but was rejected because it had no endowment. It now owes $90,000 finds that the support of the African Methodist Episcopal Church is far from enough to put it into the black. President Charles L. Hill has approached 102 foundations for help, in almost every case was turned down "when they found out I'm not accredited." Wilberforce cannot join the United Negro College Fund or the Ohio Foundation of Independent Colleges. Says Hill: "Making regional accreditation the major criterion for gifts from industry is overlooking the years and years of rich contributions which the church schools have made. Before the North Central Association was in existence, Wilberforce was in existence turning out fine Negro leaders."

Armed with such case histories, Salem's Duane Hurley hopes to persuade foundation and corporation officials to review their policies. He is perfectly willing to admit that some of the nonaccredited campuses are not worth saving, and he does not want the accrediting agencies to lower their standards. But the "forgotten colleges" represent an investment of $200 million, are equipped to handle 100,000 students. In view of the coming tidal wave of applicants, says Hurley, the U.S. would do well to keep a good proportion of these campuses alive. "Many of these schools," adds one of Hurley's sympathizers, President John Dawson of Adrian (Mich.) College, "are old schools. They are not fly-by-night institutions . . . The nation cannot afford either to close them or permit any of its good colleges to remain weak. We do not have enough of them as it is."

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