Goodbye, Old Paint

Earlier this spring, I decided that the time for my retirement would be in the summer of 2014.  I have already talked to the dean about it, and I will announce to the department when school starts.  I am happy here, but I am starting to get burned out, and it's time to move on. 

In the last few weeks, I have discovered something else that reinforces the fact that this is a good time to retire.  This blog has been full of reports about the difficulties that this little college has had to work through.  We have eliminated the problems, and the people that were the source of the problems, and soon (probably October) the accrediting body will rule, and we are all expecting a good report.  So far, so good.  But enrollment was down last fall, and I knew we would be down again this fall.  I expected a relatively small down tick, which I thought would be reversed in a year after we get our expected clean bill of health. 

BUT, I just found out that our expected enrollment this fall is only about 1000 students.  This is down a whopping 50% from 2 years ago.  Holy macaroni and cheese!  Much of this is due to the problems we have had to work through.  Much of it, however, is due to the local paper printing exaggerating and misleading reports on this.  Just a couple of weeks ago, they printed on the front page of the Sunday paper an article about another college in another state that lost its accreditation, but the picture was of this college, and the headlines implied we were headed in the same direction.  I found out later that the situation at that other college was entirely different.  Does the paper want us to die?  It would seem so. 

We were able to hire a new math professor, who will start in January.  The good news is that this person can also teach some computer science.  Given that, the college may not feel the need to replace me next year!

The road home is looking better and better.