How the only for-profit Div. I school is building a monster in the desert
Grand Canyon makes a lot of money and is ready to make a lot of noise
PHOENIX -- As he shuffles around the new NBA-like practice facility stashed next to his home arena, Phoenix Suns legend "Thunder" Dan Majerle is soft-spoken yet instructive in a quick Sunday afternoon practice in December. Twenty years ago, he was nearing the conclusion of a 14-year NBA career that included three All-Star Games and two appearances on the league's all-defensive team.
Today, he wobbles on the sideline with worn knees as the head coach at Grand Canyon University, a private Christian college and Division I basketball's only for-profit institution. Majerle is enjoying his team's first season of eligibility for the NCAA tournament after a lengthy transition period to the Division I level that started in 2013.
"I've grown up wanting to be in the NCAA tournament," said Joshua Braun, the WAC's preseason player of the year. "That'd be sweet to be a part of history and do that.
Braun, a Phoenix native and Majerle's first recruit, remembers when the school's basketball teams practiced in a small, dark gym cooled by portable air conditioners in the summer.
Grand Canyon University's team, the most popular squad on a modern, sprawling campus, is the school's beacon to the world and proof of its remarkable turnaround.
In 2004, a group of local investors rescued the university when it had just 900 students on a crumbling campus and paid off its $20 million debt load. To repay the investors and regain its footing, the school turned to Wall Street and shed its nonprofit status. Grand Canyon now has the only college basketball program affiliated with a for-profit school.
GCU has endured the stigma often attached to for-profit schools. Recent federal crackdowns magnified the negative image of for-profit institutions, which are often cast as shady degree mills that attract financially strapped students who qualify for sizable federal loans but fail to receive adequate educational experiences.
More than 19,000 students attend the GCU campus, and another 70,000 students pursue degrees online, which creates a fruitful revenue stream -- the school generated $218 million in the second quarter of 2017 alone, $4 million more than professional wrestling giant WWE's earnings in the same period -- for a school that earns 79 percent of its revenue from federal student financial aid, per azcentral.com. But it comes with a cost.
GCU topped all landowners in the city of Phoenix last year with its $9.2 million property tax bill, a number school officials say is unsustainable and will require a switch from for-profit to nonprofit status to reduce that burden. This will be the second time in three years that GCU has tried to eliminate the property tax burden. The school was rejected the first time.
"The for-profit model suggests that the only thing that matters is the bottom line, and that works against the idea of an institution that serves society," said Kevin Kinser, an expert on for-profit schools and the chair of the education policy studies department at Penn State.
But GCU's men's basketball program -- the school spent $4.3 million on the sport last year -- is thriving amid the controversy surrounding the school's explosive, unconventional financial boom over the past decade and the sudden immersion into Division I athletics that followed.
The Antelopes use a five-star practice facility that features three courts, offices for men's and women's basketball, a lounge for each team and a film room. Majerle can watch practice from the second-floor balcony outside his office.
Some high-majors fought for years to finance comparable luxuries. But GCU opened its practice facility in 2017, four years into its Division I transition. In 2014, Grand Canyon Arena, the team's home facility that includes a three-ton, high-definition video board, temporarily shut down to add 2,000 seats as part of a multimillion-dollar investment in the school's most visible sport.
The facilities have enhanced recruiting at GCU.
Four-star recruit Tim Finke rejected offers from Northwestern, Creighton, Notre Dame, Illinois and USC and committed to Grand Canyon in November. Casey Benson, a grad transfer who played in the Final Four with Oregon last season, is averaging 9.6 PPG and 5.0 APG this season
Do you guys think GCU can be the next Gonzaga?
Grand Canyon makes a lot of money and is ready to make a lot of noise
PHOENIX -- As he shuffles around the new NBA-like practice facility stashed next to his home arena, Phoenix Suns legend "Thunder" Dan Majerle is soft-spoken yet instructive in a quick Sunday afternoon practice in December. Twenty years ago, he was nearing the conclusion of a 14-year NBA career that included three All-Star Games and two appearances on the league's all-defensive team.
Today, he wobbles on the sideline with worn knees as the head coach at Grand Canyon University, a private Christian college and Division I basketball's only for-profit institution. Majerle is enjoying his team's first season of eligibility for the NCAA tournament after a lengthy transition period to the Division I level that started in 2013.
"I've grown up wanting to be in the NCAA tournament," said Joshua Braun, the WAC's preseason player of the year. "That'd be sweet to be a part of history and do that.
Braun, a Phoenix native and Majerle's first recruit, remembers when the school's basketball teams practiced in a small, dark gym cooled by portable air conditioners in the summer.
Grand Canyon University's team, the most popular squad on a modern, sprawling campus, is the school's beacon to the world and proof of its remarkable turnaround.
In 2004, a group of local investors rescued the university when it had just 900 students on a crumbling campus and paid off its $20 million debt load. To repay the investors and regain its footing, the school turned to Wall Street and shed its nonprofit status. Grand Canyon now has the only college basketball program affiliated with a for-profit school.
GCU has endured the stigma often attached to for-profit schools. Recent federal crackdowns magnified the negative image of for-profit institutions, which are often cast as shady degree mills that attract financially strapped students who qualify for sizable federal loans but fail to receive adequate educational experiences.
More than 19,000 students attend the GCU campus, and another 70,000 students pursue degrees online, which creates a fruitful revenue stream -- the school generated $218 million in the second quarter of 2017 alone, $4 million more than professional wrestling giant WWE's earnings in the same period -- for a school that earns 79 percent of its revenue from federal student financial aid, per azcentral.com. But it comes with a cost.
GCU topped all landowners in the city of Phoenix last year with its $9.2 million property tax bill, a number school officials say is unsustainable and will require a switch from for-profit to nonprofit status to reduce that burden. This will be the second time in three years that GCU has tried to eliminate the property tax burden. The school was rejected the first time.
"The for-profit model suggests that the only thing that matters is the bottom line, and that works against the idea of an institution that serves society," said Kevin Kinser, an expert on for-profit schools and the chair of the education policy studies department at Penn State.
But GCU's men's basketball program -- the school spent $4.3 million on the sport last year -- is thriving amid the controversy surrounding the school's explosive, unconventional financial boom over the past decade and the sudden immersion into Division I athletics that followed.
The Antelopes use a five-star practice facility that features three courts, offices for men's and women's basketball, a lounge for each team and a film room. Majerle can watch practice from the second-floor balcony outside his office.
Some high-majors fought for years to finance comparable luxuries. But GCU opened its practice facility in 2017, four years into its Division I transition. In 2014, Grand Canyon Arena, the team's home facility that includes a three-ton, high-definition video board, temporarily shut down to add 2,000 seats as part of a multimillion-dollar investment in the school's most visible sport.
The facilities have enhanced recruiting at GCU.
Four-star recruit Tim Finke rejected offers from Northwestern, Creighton, Notre Dame, Illinois and USC and committed to Grand Canyon in November. Casey Benson, a grad transfer who played in the Final Four with Oregon last season, is averaging 9.6 PPG and 5.0 APG this season
Do you guys think GCU can be the next Gonzaga?
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