Colleges plan for slump

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CLEMSON, S.C. -- At the giant public university here, officials are bracing for likely state budget cuts. They hope fundraising can help make up any gap, so that students won't feel the brunt.

At the community college and at the small Christian college just outside town, commuting students are having to work extra hours to cover the surging cost of gas.

The national economic downturn is certainly felt in college towns like this one, home to three very different institutions within a few miles of each other and situated in a region still smarting from thousands of textile job losses.

As for job prospects for new graduates, the outlook is mixed. Last fall, a survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers predicted campus hiring would be up 16 percent for the class of 2008. An updated survey last week revises that figure downward but still predicts an increase of about 8 percent over the class of 2007.

For colleges themselves, an economic slump can be good for business, reminding people of the value of more education and pushing them to get it when other opportunities are scarce.

Colleges plan for the long haul, so many can take advantage of the effects of an economic slump, like lower construction costs and — if the current credit crunch passes — lower costs to borrow money.

In short, the economy on campus is a complicated story, best told from the point of view of some people in the midst of the forces at work.

On a break between classes, Hannah Bolt tries to get some work done in a campus coffee shop at Southern Wesleyan University, a small Christian college in the town of Central, a few minutes from Clemson.

Every minute is precious. She comes to campus four days a week, and often works the other three at a department store. Her parents have pushed her to pick a steady career, so she is studying to become a special-education teacher. Dad was a commercial fisherman and is battling health problems. Mom is a seamstress in the struggling textile industry.

"Some weeks she'll work three days and they'll say, 'We don't have anything for you to do the rest of the week, take a four-day weekend,' " Miss Bolt said.