Draft Summary of the Impacts of $4+ per Gallon Gasoline on BCC Students and Employees
(Prepared for Presidents Staff by EAC, May 2008)
Introduction
The rapidly rising cost of gasoline will almost certainly have impacts on enrollment, employees, student life, and the college operating budget. The Environmental Advisory Committee (EAC) has compiled the following list of potential impacts. This is an initial attempt to review the impact and is by no means complete, but hopefully serves as a starting point for discussion.
Impacts
- Increased cost to students and employees commuting to campus.(1)
- More students choosing to take online classes over on campus classes. This may lead to offering more online classes (reducing trips to campus) but may also lead to more students who are not really prepared for the self-discipline of online classes and a higher “failure rate”.
- Increased online demand may lead to more server time.
- The will be more need for online services – such as tutoring and advising.
- More students will prefer the 2 or 3 day per week class schedule. This will require more offerings in this mode.
- Weekend college offerings may need to be revisited, as it gives students the same class in 1 or 2 days a week.
- Demand for hybrid (part online/part on-campus) classes may increase – it seems that this is an ideal option for students, because it cuts down travel to campus, but still maintains some face-to-face time for students who need that motivation. Divisions would need support for development of more hybrid classes.
- We may just see a drop in enrollment as some more distant students find a closer option. Some employees may need to leave BCC in search of “closer” jobs.
- There may be an increased need for financial aid. (I know of at least one student is planning to “drop out” because they can’t afford to get to campus.)
- More students may be at risk of homelessness as cost of living goes up.
- Students needing to work more hours on top of going to school – may impact on time they spend on classes. Increased work-study may help students “stay in school”.
- Cost of food has been, and will continue to rise, impacting student budgets even more. This may impact total food sales and the number of “hungry” students who cannot afford to eat well.
- Impacts on textbook cost – they are not light and as shipping costs add up (from publishers, to students, and back to publishers when there are extras).
- Programs that travel (athletics, class field trips, student clubs) will be seeing a large increase in operation costs.
- Impacts on PD and college travel - PD money goes a lot less far/travel costs to conferences go up. We may see more interest in teleconferencing and/or requests for more travel money to maintain the status quo.
- May be an increase in employees interested in flextime, 4-day (10 hr) work weeks, etc.
- One of the hardest hit groups may be adjunct faculty who have to work at more than 1 college – they often spend the most time on the road and use the most gas. This may make it harder to hire good people unless we can give them more than 1 or 2 classes a quarter.
- There may be more interest in local community events (such as the multicultural fair and lectures, etc.) Suddenly, it is no longer as cheap to go to Seattle or UW for lectures, concerts, etc. More people may be interested in attending closer options.
- Increased student and employee use of bus system – may need to lobby for additional buses on routes and/or new routes to campus.
- As demand for bus ridership goes up Metro is already pressuring BCC to pay more for bus service.
- Need for more bike-friendly services – safe storage, lockers, etc.
- Increase in theft – gas siphoning, bikes, etc.
- Campus operating budget will take a hit. Unfortunately, we will see less $ savings from energy conservation, but conservation can help us at least keep from increasing costs.
- Increases in cost will hit anything that has to be transported or is made of petroleum – office supplies, equipment, books, fertilizer, building materials, maintenance supplies, paper/copies, etc.
- Payoff timelines for alternate energy generation will decrease, making this option more attractive.
- This will probably reduce our carbon footprint, although we would have liked to see a more voluntary solution.
- Worker retraining increase? – People who are priced out of there jobs (trucking, etc.) or may need to find new work that is closer to their home
- There will almost certainly will be an increased need for training for “green-collar jobs”, particularly in the area of alternate energy, energy conservation, green building, transportation, waste management, etc.
Bottom line – Increased cost and enrollment impact, but increased opportunities!
---
(1) Initial look at the direct cost to students:
As we look at the early transportation data, our students are commuting an average of 22 miles round trip a day at about 25 mpg. At about 42 gallons per quarter (22 miles x 50 days/25 mpg = 44 gallons per quarter) that is about $168 per quarter (on average). (Interestingly, 44 gallons is just over a barrel of oil per student per quarter – with 8-10,000 students a quarter....)
Committee Resources
The following is a list of resources that may be useful.
Impacts of Gas on Community College Students
- The Money Squeeze: Colleges look at curbing student commute - Seattle PI (June 23, 2008)
- Rising Cost of Gasoline Pinches Students at Rural Community Colleges (Subscription Required) - Chronicle of Higher Ed (June 2007)
- Dropping a Day to Save on Gas - Inside Higher Ed (May 19, 2008)
- As Gas Prices Go Up, Impact Trickles Down - New York TImes (April 30, 2008)
Page under development.
