Much attention is being focused also on new media of instruction and on new techniques in the use of special media, such as television and audiovisual devices. While these developments hold some hope for savings in instructional costs, a point we shall discuss later, we must consider also the requirements that such use could generate for specially constructed facilities. Medical and dental training facilities are currently being utilized to capacity, but the number of physicians and dentists graduating yearly is not sufficient to maintain current standards of service to our increasing population. To maintain a satisfactory population-physician ratio of 757 to 1, the output of physicians would have to expand to 9,600 in 1970, or 2,100 over the 1960 output. It has been estimated that between 14 and 20 new medical schools will have to be built if the existing population-physician ratio is to be upheld. The financial cost involved here is great since the construction of a medical school requires a capital investment of between $10 and $20 million, depending on whether a teaching hospital is already available or must be included in the investment. The factor of urgency also enters into the consideration inasmuch as there is a lag of 10 years between the planning of a school and the production of the school's first graduating class. Contributing further to the need for medical training facilities is the need for dental schools. According to projections of trends in the supply, the number of dentists in practice in 1975 will total only 96,000, which is about 15,000 fewer than will be needed to assure that dentists will be as widely available as now. To forestall such a shortage will require by 1970 facilities capable of graduating 6,180 dentists annually. This is about 2,700 more per year than are now in prospect, and will require a 75-percent increase in training capacity.3 The preparation of many professional and semiprofessional technicians also require specific kinds of facilities, other than those we have already mentioned in connection with the advanced training of scientists, engineers, physicians, and dentists. Colleges and universities have increased their organized research activities tremendously since the end of World War II. Approximately 20 percent of total education and general expenditures in 1957-58 went toward the support of organized research. This is twice the percent so expended in 1945-46. Although the major portion of these expenditures is underwritten by foundations, industry, and the Federal Government, the main burden of providing physical facilities needed to carry on research normally falls on the institutions themselves. Since organized research activities are expected to continue to increase, colleges and universities will have to devote a significant portion of their funds to equip, construct, and rehabilitate the facilities in which college and university researchers carry on their work. Still other factors will influence requirements. More and more institutions are catering to a year-round student enrollment and will have to make additional capital outlays to counteract the more rapid deterioration of buildings and to provide a more satisfactory environment for summer work (e.g., air conditioning), even as they thereby accommodate more students. There is also a need for married student housing and associated auxiliary facilities such as nursery schools, university laboratory schools, health centers, and dining areas. SPECIAL FACTORS RELATING TO RESIDENTIAL REQUIREMENTS The growing number of married students on college campuses in recent years has caused institutions to make increased investments in residential facilities for married students. A study by the Association of College and University Housing Officers shows that nearly two out of five institutions responding to their questionnaire have assumed responsibility for married students by constructing at least some of the necessary facilities. There is ample evidence that colleges and universities consider the accommodation of married students a permanent responsibility. The Office of Education's physical facilities survey reveals that 4.6 percent of college and university expenditures for construction of housing during 1951-55 was for married stu 2 Final report of the Secretary's consultants on medical research and education. "The Advancement of Medical Research and Education," U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Washington. D.C., June 1958. Bane, Frank. "Physicians for a Growing America." October 1959, p. 67. U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Public Health Service. 4 Comparison developed from data in the "Biennial Survey of Education in the United States, ch. IV. "Statistics of Higher Education." published edition of 1944-46 and advance data to be published in edition of 1956-58, U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. Office of Education. dents. Institutions estimated that during 1956-70, 9.7 percent of the expenditure for housing would be for married students. Since about 2% times as much residence space is required for a married student as for a single student, and since increasing numbers of married students are attending colleges and universities, proportionate increases in housing expenditures are unavoidable. A factor that further complicates the task of financing residential facilities is the increase in the proportion of women students in our colleges and universities, since dormitories for women are more expensive to construct than those for men. Urban universities are faced with the responsibility of providing additional housing for their expanding students bodies, as they increasingly attract undergraduate and graduate students from outside their immediate areas. Additional residential facilities will be needed by junior colleges, many of which have experienced increased enrollments. As of this date, about 240 of 276 private junior colleges provide some residential facilities for their students, as do also a few of the 391 public junior colleges. States where junior colleges abound, such as California and Texas, estimate that an increasing number of their public junior colleges will need to operate student dormitories. Other States that either are planning or will have to plan dormitories for their public junior colleges are Colorado, Mississippi, and North Dakota. One decided economic advantage of the community junior college, its proximity to the students' homes, has tended to limit the need for dormitories and other physical facilities in the public junior colleges. Whether the number of junior colleges will continue to increase as rapidly as it has since World War II is not known. However, increase in the number of these institutions will continue to receive prime consideration by States as one method of alleviating the crowded conditions in existing colleges and universities. Students who complete the training available at the community junior college will either terminate their formal education at that point or transfer to a 4-year college or university. Transfer students will then strain the instructional and residential facilities of 4-year colleges. Although junior colleges offer some opportunity for saving in total plant investment in dormitories, a rapid rate of increase in the number of junior colleges will nonetheless require substantial additional investments in instructional and general facilities. II. MAGNITUDE OF FACILITIES REQUIREMENTS, 1960-70 REVIEW OF RELATED STUDIES Several research studies conducted at National and State levels furnish important clues to the magnitude of the investment that must be made in the Nation's higher education facilities in the years immediately ahead. A study made by Long & Black projected 1957-58 enrollments to 1970 and, on the basis of this projection, estimated the additional physical plant facilities that would be required to accommodate the anticipated enrollments. The estimated enrollment increases over the 3,027,029 figure of 1957-58 ranged from a low of 2,017,000 to a high of 2,851,000. In addition to estimating the needs for expansion of facilities for the period 1957-70, Long & Black considered the cost of replacement of existing substandard facilities. Using a replacement rate of 2 percent per year, they estimated replacement of other-than-residential facilities to cost $240 million per year and the replacement of residential facilities $80 million per year. Adding the cost of replacement between 1957 and 1970 ($4.32 billion for other-thanresidential and $1.38 billion for residential) to the cost of facilities expansion, they estimated the total amount of funds needed for physical facilities at $12.19 billion to $15.26 billion, exclusive of the cost of additional land, equipment, and campus improvement. A study published by the Council for Financial Aid to Education in 1959 surveyed the plant needs of 885 leading colleges and universities during the 1957-67 decade. The estimated cost of buildings, equipment, and improvements for the 820 institutions that responded was $6.04 billion. With this figure as a Long, John D., and Black, J. B., "Needed Expansion of Facilities for Higher Education, 1958-70. How Much Will It Cost?" The American Council on Education, Washington, D.C., 1958. "Nearing the Breakthrough." Council for Financial Aid to Education, New York, N.Y., June 1959. base, it was estimated that the total cost of construction, equipment, and improvements for all higher education institutions during these 10 years would be $11.5 billion, or approximately $3,834 per student increase in enrollment, exclusive of the costs of acquisition and improvement of sites and of deterioration of buildings. In the second of its five reports of studies dealing with higher education physical facilities, the Office of Education included a chapter on projections of buildings needed through 1970. On the basis of assumptions pertaining to 1970 enrollments, additional instructional and residential needs, construction costs, needed replacement of buildings, rehabilitation of buildings, and normal plant replacement, this report estimated that for 1956-70 the cost of new construction needed to accommodate 2,823,000 additional students by 1970 would be $12.36 billion, or over $824 million per year for the 15-year period. Of the $12.36 billion needed for new construction, it was estimated that approximately $7.06 billion would be needed for instructional, research, general, and auxiliary facilities, and $5.30 billion for residential facilities. Another Office of Education statistical study indicates that 15 percent of the college facilities first occupied between 1940 and 1957 are unsatisfactory and should be razed. This heavy rate of obsolescence is due largely to the acquisition by colleges of temporary buildings under the Government's surplus 'disposal program immediately following World War II. Make-do measures during the money shortages of the depression and the materials shortages of the war period have produced a backlog of deferred replacements which cannot be indefinitely prolonged. The same study indicates that 12 percent of the buildings occupied before 1901 and still in use in 1957 should be razed, that 17 percent of those occupied between 1901 and 1920 should be replaced, and that 5 percent of those occupied between 1921 and 1940 are obsolescent. If this requirement for replacement, rehabilitation, and depreciation is projected into the predictable future, a computation based upon probable needs during the period 1958 through 1970 places the estimated cost of such measures at $4,782,650,000, or about $400 million per year. Of the $4.78 billion, $1.40 billion would be required for replacement, $505 million for rehabilitation, and $2.87 billion for depreciation. In this study it was assumed that colleges and universities were constructing both instructional and residential facilities to accommodate the additional students during the 1956-58 period, but that replacement, rehabilitation, and depreciation would continue to be deferred and that these factors would need to be cared for during the remaining 12-year period, 1958-70. Therefore, the needed construction for accommodating additional students, estimated to cost $12.36 billion, was averaged over 15 years, at $824 million per year. The cost of replacement, rehabilitation, and depreciation, estimated at $4.78 billion, was averaged over 12 years, at $399 million per year. For the 12 years, 1958-70, the average for buildings alone was determined to be in excess of $1.22 billion annually. The report of the American Council on Education included summary data of research studies made by 15 States. A compilation of the data of six States (Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Mississippi, New Mexico, and Tennessee) that had comparable data in each of the categories was made to obtain an estimate of what the cost per additional student would be to meet the needs by 1970 for residential and other-than-residential facilities. For these six States, it was found that average per student need in other-than-residential facilities would average $1,938 and that the average residential facilities cost per full-time student housed would average $4,635. It is estimated that one out of every three additional students would require housing. The estimates reached in the studies mentioned naturally differ. They constitute conclusive evidence, however, that the per-student investment in additional facilities required between now and 1970 is great indeed. U.S. Bokelman, W. Robert, and Rork. John B., "College and University Facilities Survey. Part 2: Planning for College and University Physical Plant Expansion, 1956-70." Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education, Washington, D.C.. April 1960. D'Amico, Louis A., and Higgins, E. Eugene, "College and University Facilities Survey. Part 3: Inventory of College and University Physical Facilities, Dec. 31, 1957 (A Preliminary Report)." U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare, Office of Education, Washington, D.C. BASIC ASSUMPTIONS OF THIS REPORT To determine the cost of needed facilities for any target date in the future is a complex problem in statistical forecasting. The latest comprehensive data on facilities are now 4 years old. The rate of planned construction of new facilities has certainly been modified by the constant forces of obsolescence and depreciation. A further complication is the fact that we must project into the indefinite future a rational balance among the types of facilities to be provided: new classrooms and laboratories, new residence halls, administrative office space, auditoriums, libraries, gymnasiums, hospitals, student unions, and other auxiliary facilities. The proportions in which investment must be divided among these, as well as the total amount required, are dependent upon a wide variety of factors. Data are reliably established on two important factors to be considered in estimating future building requirements: college-age population and the condition of buildings now in use. The trend in the proportion of college-age population actually in college, while it cannot be forecast with certainty, is reasonably well established, and has already been applied in part 1 of this paper. Other factors needed for making physical facilities cost estimates, such as space per student and cost per construction unit, can be established from data available on State, regional, or national levels. It is difficult, however, to assess to what extent better utilization of existing campuses will affect the total estimated cost, or to what extent the college population of the future will have to be housed. These and many other factors can be used in projecting facilities costs only through arbitrary assumptions based upon the record of the past and one's best judgment as to the future. The following assumptions have been made in projecting, for the decade ahead, the total cost of necessary expansion and improvement of the facilities of the Nation's institutions of higher education: 1, Student enrollments (a) That the percentage of full-time students in the total enrollment will continue to be 75 percent, the same percentage that existed in 1958. (b) That the 1959-60 full-time enrollment of 2,551,723 will increase to 4,504,500 full-time students by 1970-71, an increase of 1,952,777 full-time students, and that part-time enrollment will increase from 850,574 in 1959-60 to 1,501,500 by 1970-71. 2. Condition of plant (a) That because of obsolescence and substandard conditions, 12.3 percent of the instructional buildings and 10.5 percent of residential buildings need to be replaced. The gross area of instructional buildings at present is 408,275,680 square feet, of which 12.3 percent needs replacing. This amounts to an estimated need of 50,217,909 square feet. The gross area of residential buildings is 229,925,000 square feet, of which 24,142,125 square feet needs replacing (229,925.000×0.105). The total area which needs replacing amounts to 74,360,034 square feet. (b) That, in addition to the obsolete and substandard buildings mentioned above, 9.8 percent of instructional and related buildings (408,275,680×0.098) and 9.1 percent of residential buildings (229,925,000×0.091) are presently in rundown condition and functionally obsolete. These need to be returned to satisfactory condition as soon as possible. The number of additional square feet required for instructional and related buildings will amount to 40,011,017; the number for residential, 20,923,175. 3. Instructional facilities requirements (a) That a more efficient utilization of all existing instructional facilities, including those which are presently not being used, will provide accommodations for 200,000 full-time students. (This is considered a reasonable inference from the unoccupied space data presented in the "College and Universities Facilities Survey," pt. 2, p. 3.) This means that instead of planning to provide instructional facilities for 1,952,777 additional full-time students by 1970, it will be necessary to provide for only an additional 1,752,777 (1,952,777-200,000). (b) That each additional full-time student will require an average of 160 square feet of space for instructional and related purposes. (This figure is based on the calculation of 125 square feet per student developed in the facilities survey, pt. 2, and is derived by adjusting for inclusion of full-time students only.) 4. Residential facilities requirements (a) That any present excess capacity in residential facilities in colleges and universities throughout the country is more than balanced by the serious overcrowding in many other institutions—an inference based on data from page 4 of the facilities survey, part 2. (b) That institutions will continue to provide housing for one-third of the full-time students. This fraction was derived by analysis and extrapolation of residential-enrollment data also in the facilities survey. One-third of 1,952,777 (the number of anticipated full-time students by 1970) is 650,926. (c) That 90 percent of the full-time students will be single. Dormitory accommodations, therefore, will have to be made for 585,833 single students (90 percent of 650,926). (d) That 10 percent of the additional students furnished institutional-owned housing will be married, as our earlier discussion indicated. (The pertinent data are from pt. 2 of the facilities survey (table 33).) Accordingly, it is estimated that living accommodations will be necessary for 65,093 married students. (e) That each additional single student housed in institutional-owned dormitories will require 237 gross square feet of space; each student family, 572 gross square feet (amounts also derived from the facilities survey, table 4). Therefore, 138,842,421 square feet will be required for single students (585,933X 237) and 37,233,196 square feet for married students (65,093 X572). This amounts to a total requirement of 176,075,617 square feet. 5. Construction and related costs (a) That construction costs of buildings will remain at the current level, an average of approximately $20 per square foot for all types of buildings (facilities survey, table P). Although construction costs have increased 43 percent during the past 10 years, 1959 cost figures have been used for the projections of this paper. Other capital costs, including land, equipment and furniture, and campus improvements will cost 50 percent of building construction costs, making a total capital expenditure of $30 per square foot. The 280,444,320 square feet additional space required by 1970 for instructional facilities will cost $8,413,329,600, anti the 176,075,617 square feet required for residential facilities will cost $5,282,268,510. (b) That the cost per square foot for replacement of obsolescent and substandard buildings, instructional and residential, will be $20. The cost for replacing 74,360,034 square feet will amount to $1,486,642,430. (c) That the cost of returning buildings to satisfactory condition averages 50 percent of the construction cost of new buildings (i.e., $10 per square foot). The cost of rehabilitating 60,934,192 square feet will amount to $609,341,920. 6. Additional total cost (special categories) (a) That identifiable needs for specialized research-related facilities in medicine, dentistry, agriculture, engineering, and other sciences-over and above the growth assumed for increased enrollments-will require capital outlays in excess of $3 billion. This figure is based on a combination of the estimates of several other agencies concerned with these respective fields.. Factors which may alter the projections Many unmeasurable influences may turn out to have a marked effect upon the projections resulting from the assumptions stated. Some of these are as follows: 1. Factors that may reduce facilities needs: More effective space utilization, through changes in scheduling patterns, summer usage, weekend usage. Development of more economical building materials. Advances in building design. Interinstitutional sharing of facilities. Increased use of new instructional media such as television and new instructional methods. Figures developed from National Science Foundation, "Federal Financial Support of Physical Facilities and Major Equipment for the Conduct of Scientific Research,' June 1957; "The Advancement of Medical Research and Education" (footnote 2); and data provided by executive secretary, Association of Land-Grant Colleges. |