In order to still feel connected to the GA area, I read online articles from the Atlanta Journal Constitution every day.  There are always several articles that catch my attention.  Here’s what caught my eye today:

“Morehouse cuts staff; Clark Atlanta reorganizes after cuts”

An excerpt:

“On the heels of its announcement last week that it was restructuring its curriculum and letting 70 faculty members go, Clark Atlanta University on Sunday said all physical education classes had been canceled for the semester.

The cancellations were announced in a letter to students from the university’s academic affairs office.

The letter also stated that class schedule changes in the School of Arts and Sciences “will be made available to you shortly,” but that class schedules in the schools of Education, Business and Social Work would remain unchanged.

Clark Atlanta isn’t the only higher educational insitution feeling the sting of a foundering economy.

On Sunday, Morehouse College officials confirmed that 25 adjunct professors, about one-third of the part-time instructors employed there, did not have their contracts renewed for the spring semester. Full-time Morehouse faculty and staff were not affected by the move, officials said.”

Wow.  As I’ve been listening to the talks about the recession and reading different news reports, I’ve understood a couple of effects of the recession on higher education.  One effect is that schools are suffering from shrinking endowments and lack of donations.  The other effect is that in many areas, students are opting to attend their local community colleges as opposed to going away to school because it’s a cheaper alternative.  Along with this, community college enrollment is also increasing due to lay offs- many people who are laid off are taking this opportunity to go back to school and finish that degree or take classes to help sharpen their skills.

All that said, the MOST stringent handling of the recession that I’ve observed with schools is a hiring freeze.  So, reading about the cuts at Morehouse and Clark Atlanta is shocking.  I once heard it said that when America gets a cold, black America gets pneumonia.  Unfortunately, it appears to be true in this case as well.