r/CollegeBasketball • u/spierce64006 Indiana (PA) Crimson Hawks • 7d ago
D3 school Eastern Nazarene announces closure by end of 2024
https://enc.edu/news/board-announces-developing-plan-for-closure/3
u/RowRowRowedHisBoat Alabama Crimson Tide • Trevecca Na… 7d ago
Man, the Nazarene schools kinda cannibalized themselves. The church has district regions where schools were supposed to recruit kids from, and I was in an ENC district, but it never worked as intended. Olivet, Trevecca, and Mid-America were the most popular when I was a teen in the church. Point Loma was the one everyone wanted to attend, but they were fucking expensive because of their location in the San Diego bay. ENC just never seemed to have much going for it outside of its location in Boston. Offered less majors, was more expensive than some of the others, and just didn't recruit terribly well. I wouldn't be surprised if Mount Vernon and Northwest Naz followed course soon, either.
I will say, I haven't paid attention to any of the schools in 12 years, so maybe I'm a bit off. I did attend Trevecca for a bit though. Decent liberal arts school all things considered. Liked the campus.
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u/Chance-Importance237 1d ago
Mt. Vernon and Trevecca are thriving. They are going to split up the ENC territory and students and probably assets after the sale of the property. Point Loma I think has struggled in recent years because it is so expensive to run a school in San Diego. Never hear anything about Mid-America anymore. Trevecca seems to be the hot school because of Nashville.
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u/NationalJustice Auburn Tigers 6d ago
Flair up!
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u/RowRowRowedHisBoat Alabama Crimson Tide • Trevecca Na… 6d ago
I thought I had one
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u/NationalJustice Auburn Tigers 6d ago edited 6d ago
Take out that garbage and replace it with the TNU flair
(To be serious, you can add it as a second flair as well, in case you don’t know)
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u/NationalJustice Auburn Tigers 6d ago
Interesting, I was just thinking the other day how the directional Nazarene schools’ names don’t make sense, like shouldn’t this school be called Northeast Nazarene in order to be symmetric with the Northwest Nazarene in Idaho? Or the latter can rename themselves as Western Nazarene, but that won’t make as much sense as the former option since we already got Point Loma representing the Southwest and Trevecca representing the Southeast. Well, guess it doesn’t matter now…
Also, is this the first Nazarene school that’s going to close? Is there any other Nazarene school that only has a 3-digit enrollment (that might also indicate that they’re in danger)?
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u/RowRowRowedHisBoat Alabama Crimson Tide • Trevecca Na… 6d ago
I find it interesting that the Nazarenes are having a school close, but hardline conservative holiness schools like God's Bible School and Hobe Sound are doing just fine. Nazarenes are still conservative, but they are far more appealing to deal with than the Bible Methodist, Bible Missionary, Allegheny Weslyan, and Pilgrim Holiness nutsos that prop up the 2 schools I mentioned.
To answer your question regarding enrollment, Northwest has always had a pretty low enrollment, and Mid-America has dropped off pretty far too. They are both around 1200, and dropping. Wouldn't be surprised if they followed suit soon.
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u/Chance-Importance237 1d ago
I agree. Northwest and Mid-America don’t seem so healthy these days. Point Loma is at risk because it is so freaking expensive to live in San Diego. It costs more to keep staff and faculty. Also, like ENC, Point Loma is more liberal than the rest of the denomination, which makes it a target for the right-wing side of the church. The more conservative elements would be happy to see Point Loma go along with ENC.
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u/RowRowRowedHisBoat Alabama Crimson Tide • Trevecca Na… 1d ago
I know numerous pastors that are pushing kids away from Naz schools. I could even name the DS of a large US district that will not hire new grads from any Nazarene schools except the seminary.
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u/Chance-Importance237 1d ago
Does not surprise me a bit. I know one DS is very into the whole International House of Prayer movement and encourages pastors to go to their conferences. IHOP (cracks me up and makes me think of pancakes every time I hear about them) is really cultish and plagued with scandals, but it seems much more conservative and fundamentalist which is the draw for many.
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u/spierce64006 Indiana (PA) Crimson Hawks 7d ago
Yet another small Division 3 school to close. Founded back in 1900 Eastern Nazarene were based in Quincy, Massachussetts. They were down to an enrollment of just under 600 this past semester.
Eastern Nazarene have been playing most recently in the North Atlantic Conference in DIII having been invited from the defunct New England Collegiate conference in 2023. They also spent some time in the Commonwealth Coast Conference.