College Endowments Lose 24% on Average in Six Months

BOSTON (Reuters) – U.S. colleges and universities lost nearly one-quarter of their endowments’ worth in the first half of their fiscal year, forcing them to cut staff and budgets just like corporations hurt by the financial crisis. From July through December, U.S. schools’ endowments dropped an average of 24.1 percent, according to a report released by the Commonfund Institute, a nonprofit group that polled 629 educational endowments on their results.