Kent State University at Ashtabula

Ashtabula, OH

FY 2023-24 fragility

/ 100

high

Composite Fragility Score over time

Pillar trajectories

Operating Margin

(Operating revenue − operating expenses) / operating revenue. Industry-standard debt-rating heuristics — Fitch-style bands for privates, Moody's-aligned for publics. Score reflects current year and 3-year rolling average — single positive years don't erase chronic distress.

Amber dot = unusual single-year shift; smoothed metric attenuates impact. Hover for context.

Pricing Power

Real net tuition revenue per FTE, 5-year change. Falling real net tuition + rising discount rate = market rejection of value proposition. Discount rate is the all-student institutional rate (F2C05 + F2C06 funded + unfunded grants over gross tuition); schools typically publish a first-time-in-college rate which runs 5-10 points higher.

Amber dot = unusual single-year shift; smoothed metric attenuates impact. Hover for context.

Debt Burden

Viability ratio (expendable net assets / plant debt) with debt-acceleration penalty. Catches schools whose covenants are at risk because of recent debt issuance.

Liquidity

Days cash on hand. Tuition-collapse override prevents 'deathbed cash' from misleading the score (high cash from emergency relief while school is shrinking).

Administrative spending

Institutional Support (administration) measured two ways, from IPEDS expense-by-function reporting: as a share of total operating expenses alongside Instruction (faculty/teaching), and indexed against net tuition revenue to show whether admin spending tracks the revenue that funds it.

Admin: 4.2% → 6.8% · Instruction: 47.6% → 56.4%

Instruction and Institutional Support as a share of total operating expenses. Instruction is the IPEDS faculty/teaching proxy; Institutional Support is the administrative proxy (executive management, finance, HR, general admin). A narrowing gap means admin is gaining on teaching.

Student-to-admin ratio · AY 2023-24

43.8:1

657 student FTE ÷ 15 full-time admin

66% below Carnegie peer average — more admin-dense than peers

Carnegie reference

127.7:1

Carnegie 12 · n=33

Mean students-per-admin across schools in the same Carnegie classification (target excluded). Higher means leaner administrative footprint.

What “admin” means here: Management (OCCUPCAT 300) + Business and Financial Operations (OCCUPCAT 310) full-time staff — the “decision-making admin” headcount. Source: IPEDS S2023_OC survey (Fall 2023). This is a headcount metric, not a dollar metric, so it isn’t contaminated by regional salary differences. Not part of the fragility score; surfaced as descriptive context only.

Program earnings outcomes

From the HEA Group’s January 2026 release of program-level earnings data used in AHEAD negotiations. Each tested program is checked against a same-state high-school-graduate earnings benchmark; programs also subject to OBBBA Gainful Employment lose Title IV eligibility on a fail and are flagged AT RISK.

Earnings by Program

Median earnings 4 years post-completion vs the earnings benchmark. 2 programs fall below the benchmark.

Benchmark

$34,808

OH HS-only median

Teacher Education and Professional Development Specific Levels and Methods
Associate · 58 completers in earnings cohort
FAIL -1K
Health and Medical Administrative Services
Associate · 18 completers in earnings cohort
FAIL -2K
Computer Science
Bachelor · 121 completers in earnings cohort
PASS +57K
Construction Management
Bachelor · 55 completers in earnings cohort
PASS +55K
Computer Systems Analysis
Bachelor · 77 completers in earnings cohort
PASS +45K
Registered Nursing Nursing Administration Nursing Research and Clinical Nursing
Bachelor · 699 completers in earnings cohort
PASS +43K
Computer and Information Sciences General
Bachelor · 78 completers in earnings cohort
PASS +42K

Source: HEA Group Jan 2026 release using AHEAD-negotiations data. Pooled 2017-18 + 2018-19 completer cohorts; earnings measured CY 2022-23, inflation-adjusted to 2024 (CPI-U). Only programs with sufficient Title-IV completers appear in the test. “AT RISK” = fails the OBBBA Gainful Employment threshold — loss of Title IV eligibility likely, program likely closes.

Latest-year breakdown (FY 2023-24)

Pillar	Raw Metric	Score
Operating Margin	-12.7%	25 / 25
Pricing Power	$6,169 real net tuition / FTE	25 / 25
Debt Burden	—	12 / 25
Liquidity	—	12 / 25

Peer schools

Closest by Fragility Score in FY 2023-24. Financial similarity only — geographic / regional clustering is a separate (future) feature.

Less fragile

Schools scoring below

More fragile

Schools scoring above

Selected raw financials — FY 2023-24

GASB / IPEDS Finance F1A. DSO totals from LLM enrichment of audited financial statements; see /sources for citations.

Total revenue (F1B27)

$10.9M

Total expenses (F1C191)

$12.3M

Net tuition revenue (F1B01)

$4.1M

Auxiliary enterprises revenue (F1B05)

State appropriations (F1B11)

$4.8M

Endowment EOY (F1H02)

—

Long-term debt (F1A10)

—

Expendable net position (F1N05)

—

Interest expense (F1C19IN)

$10K

DSO debt — campus-specific

—

DSO debt — system-level pool

—