School Name: Albany State University
Median Cost of Attendance: $17 982
Undergraduate Population: 4 187
Endowment Needed: $1 505 812 640
Analysis: Albany State University needs approximately an endowment of $1.5 billion for all of its undergraduates to attend debt free. It is located in Georgia’s eighth largest city which boast a population of almost 80 000 according to the last census. Albany is also a city where the African American population comprises over 70 percent of the population. The school’s current endowment is only 1 percent of the needed endowment. This is a note of concern given Albany State University has the second highest reported student loan debt per graduates in the SIAC and 90 percent of their graduates have some sort of student loan debt. The 90 percent is actually in line with the HBCU average, but still 35 percent above the national average. Being located in the southwestern part of Georgia gives the school geographic advantage to the panhandle of Florida for recruitment opportunities. Opportunities abound for Albany State University, but key to them will be finding a way to get alumni connected in such a way that their endowment is doubling every year for the next ten years. Otherwise, they will continue to be on the list of schools to watch and we have already seen in Georgia that merger talk is never far away.
As always it should be noted that endowments provide a myriad of subsidies to the university for everything from scholarship, faculty & administration salaries, research, and much more.
HBCU Money 