The Inside Story Of The King’s College Death Spiral Of 2023
Students at The King’s College in the NYC Semester in Journalism (NYCJ) program in the fall of 2018. Photo by Paul Glader.
The perilous state of The King’s College in New York City developed over decades, hit turbulence in the past two years, then turned into a stunning death spiral in the Spring 2023 semester.
Documents and interviews with insiders offer a more complete picture of key economic, strategic and circumstantial factors leading to the dramatic turn of events that left students, staff, faculty and families in limbo for months.
The King’s Debt
The King’s College is a small but ambitious Christian college in downtown Manhattan a block from the New York Stock Exchange. Advertising itself as the “only Christian liberal arts college in New York City,” King’s mission is, in part, to “transform society by preparing students for careers in which they help to shape and eventually to lead strategic public and private institutions.
As a Christian non-profit, King’s relied on considerable donations and fundraising on top of student tuition payments to stay afloat and faced higher housing and operating costs because of its New York location. The school had to raise as much as $10 million to stay in business each year for at least the last decade, according to numerous sources in King’s administration and the school’s annual IRS Form 990s.
This deficit was made even larger by dropping enrollment numbers, yielding less tuition money, as a direct result of the Covid-19 pandemic. At the same time, donations totaling roughly $50 million from the estate of the late board members, Richard and Helen DeVos, stopped after a final gift in 2019.
“There were significant donations coming in from the DeVos family that were transformative to keep the school going,” said David Bahnsen, a former board member of King’s who is an investor and pundit.
As tuition dollars and donors declined during the pandemic, the King’s Board of Trustees signed a complicated agreement with a Canada-based company called Primacorp Ventures Inc. and its leader Peter Chung in 2021 in hopes to save King’s.
Primacorp promised to invest millions into digital marketing, admissions and fundraising and, in exchange, would receive 95% of the revenue from tuition spent on online programs and 15% of tuition revenue spent for on-campus programs according to 990s and multiple sources.
Primacorp hired dozens of staff, invested in online degree programs and even started planning an ambitious “Global Rotation” program that would involve students studying in four different world cities.
The partnership drew plenty of concerns by faculty, and it strained under several hiccups and delays as few online students enrolled in 2021 and 2022. Culture clashes emerged at times between King’s staff and Primacorp leaders. But the two parties soldiered on and the partnership continued.
By the fall of 2022, the college also negotiated and signed a contract to renew a 12-year lease starting January 2024 on its floors in the United Federation of Teachers building in lower Manhattan.
In the fall of 2022, the admissions department at King’s and Interim President Stockwell Day gave a more upbeat message on a rebound for enrollment and tuition. They said applications tripled compared to the previous September and appeared on target to land 125 students for Fall 2023. This suggested that King’s could finally pull out of a Covid-19 slump that reduced enrollment dramatically to 265 students by Fall 2022, according to sources in the King’s administration.
An About Face
Meanwhile, in mid-November, the school announced a “right-sizing” initiative that included a string of cost cuts such as eliminating five of 28 faculty positions, reducing the physical footprint of King’s by giving up some faculty office space, the O’Keeffe Student Union and aiming for a student body of 385 in the future.
In January 2023, however, the strategy dramatically shifted. At a faculty meeting on Jan. 12 to kick off the spring semester, King’s faculty were met with a gut punch. Instead of “right-sizing” the school as planned weeks earlier, leaders of the college told faculty that the entire college was in dire financial straits and may not survive to the end of the semester.
“Do we close? Do we stay open? Do we sell this? Do we sell that? Everything has to be put on the table,” Interim President Day told the faculty, according to several members present. “It’s required from board members. You have to show that you have planned and discussed every possible reality.”
As a whirlwind of debts, chaos and uncertainty emerged at King’s, the community remarkably came together in a spirit of prayer and shared concern. At the same time, many also reflected on the history of King’s and what chain of events or decisions led to this institutional death spiral.
A Courageous but Chaotic History (1938 to 1999)
The key to understanding King’s current situation is to understand its roots. King’s has shifted locations, leaders and curriculums from its earliest days. Located in three states, having nine presidents and closing at one point in the 1990s, King’s has often lacked a strong foundation or a sure future.
Dr. Percy Crawford started The King’s College in 1938 in Belmar, New Jersey. Before starting King’s, Crawford was a Fitzgeraldean frat boy who rejected religion until he attended a 1923 church service, prompting him to reconsider his life choices.
“God knew I was at the crisis, the crossroads, and that I was either going one hundred percent for the devil or for Jesus Christ,” Crawford said in his testimony. “I long that other young men and women, fellows and girls, may not let anything keep them away from the Son of God.”
Crawford attended the Bible Institute of Los Angeles (now known as BIOLA University), transferred to Wheaton College in Illinois and later to Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, Pa. Crawford simultaneously started youth rallies across the East Coast and never remained in one place. The one constant in his life was a passion for bringing the Christian gospel to young people.
After his conversion, Crawford started The King’s College with intentions “to combine a sane, evangelistic zeal with the highest standards of sound scholarship.” By Sept. 1938, nearly 70 students enrolled at King’s. A 1939 document notes that “[King’s] is not a Bible school, nor is it a school with the sole purpose of offering instruction in Arts and Sciences. The founders established King’s College with the view of coordinating the two programs.”
The college started with the Young People’s Association for the Propagation of the Gospel, one of Crawford’s ministries, purchasing the Marconi Hotel in Belmar, New Jersey. By 1939, the college had 100 students enrolled and was starting to develop the senior year program. The school flourished; it had a full men’s basketball team and robust extracurricular activities alongside the theological and academic programs.
Crawford spent the rest of his life multitasking with multiple ministries including traveling to preach, writing books and starting a radio show known as “Young People’s Church of the Air.” He started a television program and worked with other evangelists such as Billy Graham, who spoke at Crawford’s funeral. Crawford, known as “The Pioneer,” was revered as a minister as well as an entrepreneur.
Although successful in many of his evangelical startups, Crawford’s lack of presence at King’s left the college largely undersupported in its beginning. Though it persevered, Crawford’s tumultuous nature arguably instilled a transient nature in King’s.
During World War II, the college remained resilient. In 1941, it sold its campus to the United States Military, renaming the location “Camp Evans,” and moved to New Castle, Delaware, where it sought state accreditation. Women predominantly populated the college, and that remains true to this day: women accounted for 64% of the student body in 2022.
“The college relocated to Delaware, as the college was having difficulty securing permanent certification from the New Jersey Department of Education,” said Fred Carle. “The Army did not force them out.”
King’s moved to Briarcliff Lodge in New York in 1955, and five years later Robert Cook took over and remained president for 23 years. During this time, the college required students to attend chapel every day and sign a pledge each day at Chapel, which outlined the school’s moral standard for students.
“My TKC experience helped me come up with [a statement of faith] as real personal convictions,” said Eugene Douglass, Class of 1979. Douglass majored in Chemistry, a program that King’s discontinued upon reopening in 1999 and adopting the Politics, Philosophy and Economics core.
“I am so grateful for my time at King's and the life-long friendships I made there. I graduated well equipped professionally and spiritually to make a difference in the world for Christ,” Beth Ann Ferner, Class of 1983, said in her TKC letter. “Four decades later, I can honestly say with the Psalmist that ‘All the paths of the Lord are steadfast love and faithfulness, for those who keep his covenant and his testimonies.’”
Alumni from this era noted that Cook mirrored Crawford in that he was typically traveling or preoccupied with other ministries. The school thrived for the time being, but the lack of present, strong leadership loomed over the college. Some of the alumni also noted that some of the campus consisted of old warehouses formerly used to manufacture lead, which rendered the location unusable and attributed to the college’s accumulating debt.
Cook was often focused on his other projects and ministries, including books, preaching and a radio show formerly called “The King’s Hour” but which he rebranded as “Walk with the King.” Cook’s show brought both exposure and revenue to the college, and when Cook died the financial lifeline died with him. Friedhelm Radandt served as president for a short time, but struggled to recruit enough donors to plug the college’s financial holes.
King’s closed in 1994 after the Middle States Commission on Higher Education revoked the college’s accreditation but still kept its charter, which is intact and currently displayed in two frames on the wall next to the Executive Wing entrance on the fifth floor of King’s.
Because the college kept the charter, it was able to reopen in the late 1990s in the basement of the Empire State Building. King’s charter - a painstaking document to obtain in New York state – is still one of its major assets, according to several sources.
King’s Takes On Manhattan (1999 to 2020)
With the charter at the ready, Radandt searched for partners to reopen the school. Eventually he connected with Bill Bright, the founder of CRU (previously known as Campus Crusade for Christ).
In 1997 Campus Crusade successfully petitioned to take over the school. While Bright was eager to reopen the school, outstanding debts left over from Briarcliff prevented immediate action and had to be addressed first.
This problem would be resolved by an unlikely ally – Northeastern Bible College, a Christian institution that closed back in 1990 but retained control of most of its assets with the hope of donating them to a worthy successor. After negotiations, Campus Crusade acquired those assets and in 1999 was able to pay off The King’s College’s outstanding debt and fund its reopening with the leasing of 45,000 square feet spanning three floors in the Empire State Building.
Bright and Campus Crusade staff helped resuscitate King’s and made a New York City-based presence a priority for the future development of the college, as he believed that the college could influence the city just as much as the city could invigorate King’s.
Within its first year in Manhattan the college adopted the Politics, Philosophy and Economics core curriculum (PPE) from Oxford University, a major aspect of King’s branding to this day.
Bright then appointed Campus Crusade Minister J. Stanley Oakes Jr. to take on the role of president in 2003. Oakes was a former employee and zealous advocate for The King’s College’s mission to develop leaders with a Christian worldview.
“As I recall my The King’s College days as a founding member of the Manhattan campus under the leadership of Stan Oakes, there were incredible blessings and testimonies,” Jae Won, former Dean of Admissions and Assistant to the President from 1999-2000, said in an interview. “Every Friday, we used to hold night prayer meetings in the basement of the Empire State Building… we were serving together as missionaries in the community. Stan Oakes brought us together as he was a visionary and leader and had hearts for evangelism in the heart of Manhattan.”
Campus Crusade never advertised a political alignment, but Oakes quickly established King’s as a conservative evangelical institution. Oakes wrote several articles on political issues and instilled a conservative view in the curriculum as best he could, at least enough to be able to label the school as conservative for marketing.
Oakes particularly coined the tagline “God, Money, Power,” which many criticized for its neo-capitalist and imperialist aura.
“Though there has been some confusion about what Oakes’ originally meant by the phrase, the most common interpretation is that God, money, and power should be the most important things to a Christian college student,” Johnathan Fitzgerald said in an essay. “It also appears several times in the King’s faculty handbook, linking God, money, and power to the ‘ruling disciplines’ of politics, philosophy, economics, and theology. These are the areas of society that graduates should penetrate.”
“We can now confidently predict that we will have 2,000 outstanding students within 10 years,” Oakes said in an interview with The Old Schoolhouse. Leadership was shamelessly optimistic about the future of King’s.
While the school saw some alumni find outsized success and occasional enrollment growth, Oakes developed brain cancer and was forced to temporarily step down. Then board member Andrew “Andy” Mills became interim president. After his treatment in 2009, Oakes returned as president and began looking for both a successor and a new property to lease, the school having outgrown its space on a few floors of the Empire State Building, including its dark and cramped basement. This was complicated by his condition – even post-treatment his health was in a questionable state, and soon the board decided they would need new leadership.
Around that time, conservative commentator and writer Dinesh D’Souza had become a celebrity at Christian conferences. Despite primarily being known as a conservative pundit, in 2007 he published What’s so Great About Christianity?, an exploration of the faith that drew praise from Christian circles and rebranded him as a more moderate and gentle persona.
This rebranding made him popular in the Christian educational sphere, and Interim President Mills recruited him to apply to be the school’s next president. Dinesh D’Souza was selected to replace Oakes, and took over as President in 2010.
“They were swinging for the fences,” MinistryWatch president Warren Smith recalled in an interview with The Empire State Tribune. “They were looking to hit a home run.”
During D’Souza’s tenure, the school finalized a deal with the United Federation of Teachers and, in 2012, leased several floors worth of space at 52 Broadway. (The official legal and mailing address for King’s is 56 Broadway, but the physical address is 52 Broadway.)
Most notably, D’Souza brought Richard and Helen DeVos to the King’s board, and the family soon became the school’s most influential donor. Between 2012 and 2020, the DeVos family gave roughly $50 million to The King’s College, according to the DeVos Foundation’s 990s.
A 2011 story in New York Magazine noted that “the college plans to double its enrollment within the next four years.” The publication insinuated that this growth would require the college to compromise its academic integrity.
The decision to hire D’Souza was not without friction, however. Marvin Olasky, the school’s provost and a notable author and editor, was staunchly against hiring D’Souza, and resigned in protest following his appointment.
His concerns would prove prescient. In September 2012, Smith, then a reporter for World Magazine, reported that D’Souza was planning on getting engaged to a new girlfriend, despite both he and the woman being married to other people. The story went viral with updates in both the mainstream and Christian press.
“It spoke a bit as to just how new Dinesh was to the faith and the evangelical subculture,” Smith recalled in his interview.
Following this bombshell, the school began digging deeper. Later that year D’Souza would resign as president, leaving the school scrambling for a new leader. D’Souza later ran afoul of campaign finance laws and was sentenced to five years of probation.
After D’Souza left the college the board ran a search and eventually settled on Gregory Thornbury of Union University, and in 2013 he became the institution’s new President.
Thornbury was a wunderkind in the evangelical world and spent time in its largest denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention. At his inauguration in the spring of 2014, Thornbury was praised by Southern Baptist leaders such as Dr. Russell Moore and Dr. David S. Dockery.
Thornbury was also seen fawning over a donor he was courting for King’s, Rebecca Mercer, who backed Steve Bannon’s Breitbart and later became a supporter of Donald Trump. Thornbury also later gave Mercer an honorary doctorate at a King’s commencement ceremony. Her family foundation’s 990s forms show she gave King’s $300,000 in 2016.
“The college is just apocalyptically expensive to run,” Thornbury said in an interview with The Empire State Tribune. “It required massive amounts of fresh fundraising capital every year. The cash deficit when I came in was $10 million a year. We got it down to about $7-$8 million with enrollment increases. The rest was fundraising and Title IV federal student financial aid. The hope was getting a $100 million gift to buy housing – we only got $19-20 million for [DeVos Hall]... If you don’t own property in NYC, you’re only as good as steep fundraising lifts.”
King’s continued to grow at a steady pace under Thornbury’s leadership, acquiring an additional 3,200 square feet of space in the basement for the O’Keeffe Student Union in 2015. In 2017 he stepped down as president and briefly served as the school’s Chancellor. He was succeeded as president by retired Air Force General Tim Gibson, a member of the Parent’s Advisory Committee.
Under Gibson, the school purchased the Riff Hotel for a reported $19.2 million in 2018 to expand its housing options, real estate assets and to accommodate growth. The school converted the building into dorm rooms for on-campus housing and opened in 2019 as DeVos Hall, named after mega-donors Richard and Betsy DeVos.
David French, now a columnist with The New York Times opinion pages, gives a talk at King’s in January of 2019. Photo by Paul Glader.
Majors such as business, finance and Journalism, Culture and Society were growing steadily at King’s. Many alumni were landing prestigious jobs at Wall Street banks, major media outlets and being accepted into top 10 law schools including Harvard Law School. Notable public intellectuals, high profile journalists and Academic elites regularly spoke at King’s. Many King’s faculty published in prominent journals and outlets and received appointments at Ivy League institutions and grants from prestigious foundations. At the time, the future looked bright for King’s as it headed into its 2019-2020 school year.
Then the world turned upside down.
The Covid-19 pandemic arrived in New York City in March of 2020. Initial uncertainty about the severity of the situation soon gave way and the school’s campus was forced to close, pushing both students and faculty into an exclusively-online arrangement midway through an active semester. The school under President Gibson’s direction announced it would operate in hybrid fashion with some students online and some in-person during the 2020-2021 school year.
In recent years, many King’s students came from Christian families in states such as Texas, California and North Carolina. With lockdowns, vaccine mandates and waves of crime ticking upward in New York City, King’s became a less attractive option for many families and enrollment started to slide.
A Partnership with Primacorp and Peter Chung in a Post-Pandemic Era (2021 to 2023)
The Covid-19 pandemic hit institutions of higher education universally, but not necessarily equally. Some schools rebounded stronger than ever, while others struggled to return to pre-Covid enrollment numbers. King’s was an example of the latter.
At the time, King’s desperately needed a partner with deep pockets. The school had not found new mega-donors to replace the DeVos family, who ratcheted down their giving after Richard and Helen died, culminating in a final donation of $5 million in 2019 before closing the valve entirely.
At the same time, King’s also had not reduced the size of its faculty or staff even though enrollment went from 542 in 2018 to 416 in 2020 according to the New York State Education Department. The pandemic added more weight to King’s strategic and financial burden as enrollment dipped further to 265 by the fall of 2022 according to sources in academic administration at King’s.
Despite attempts to return to a new normal, the college faced a myriad of enrollment obstacles, in addition to the financial strain. The college’s location in New York City intimidated many parents and incoming freshmen who bore safety concerns about rising crime rates, Black Lives Matter protests and Asian-American/Pacific Islander attacks. Even by the end of 2021, Covid-19 was still spreading quickly due to the dense population in the city as well as mutating and developing new strains.
The college responded by offering hybrid courses and masking, which was received negatively from the conservative families making up the bulk of King’s key marketing demographic. King’s also emphasized safety during recruiting events called “Invisos,” on its website and other admissions and marketing initiatives.
Safety and health issues were not the only factors thwarting enrollment. A demographic drop-off from 2025 onward looms over all postsecondary educational institutions, with a significantly shrinking college-aged population that makes recruiting freshmen increasingly competitive.
That’s when a new player entered King’s offices at 56 Broadway: Primacorp Ventures, Inc., a Canada-based independent for-profit corporation led by founder and CEO Peter Chung. Although Chung has wide-ranging business interests in real estate and other sectors, he also has a long history in the business of higher education.
Born to a Korean-American family and raised in Los Angeles, Chung “demonstrated early an aptitude for business and making money [and] was realizing his own dreams of wealth, walking a gilded path through some of America's most celebrated universities,” according to an article on Chung written by The Province in 2012. “Soon, he was running a multimillion-dollar business enterprise that included schools and real-estate ventures.”
However, Chung got into hot water with the State of California in the early 1990s as owner of Wilshire Computer College, which closed permanently after an investigation and civil case filed by the California Attorney General’s office stated that they “found over 5,000 violations of false advertising regulations and over 10,000 violations of unfair competition regulations.”
Margaret Reiter, a prosecutor in the civil case against Chung, told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation that the court ordered a $2 million civil penalty and a $12 million payout to students who had been harmed. Reiter also noted they were able to collect only a small portion of the judgment.
Chung told The Providence in an interview that he “lost everything to the state and banks” but “never had to pay the $12 million to the students.”
"I never admitted to wrongdoing – to this day I don't," Chung said.
Chung then moved to Canada and started the Eminata Group, which owns six Canadian colleges including CDI College, one of Canada’s biggest providers of for-profit educational programs. The Canadian Broadcast Corporation investigated alleged fraud at CDI College in the fall of 2022.
In 2020 Primacorp bailed out Quest University, a non-profit secular university near Vancouver. The bailout required Quest to sell its campus and the land it was on to Primacorp, who agreed to lease it back to them. Primacorp discreetly put the land up for sale in late 2022, and Quest announced it would be closing in Spring 2023.
As a professing Christian, Chung was also involved with Campus Crusade for Christ in Canada among other organizations. The late Steven Douglass, King’s board member and former president of Campus Crusade, suggested King’s talk to Chung and made the initial introduction in late 2019 according to several sources.
King’s announced an official collaboration with Primacorp in May of 2021. In the official press release, Chief of Staff Megan Dishman stated that “under the terms of the agreement, Primacorp will provide resourcing and expertise for student recruitment, marketing, and fundraising.”
“The King’s College engaged Primacorp with two primary goals,” the press release continued. “First, to grow the NYC program to optimize use of the current campus. Second, to build out online academic programs, such as King’s Crossover and forthcoming non-credit certificate courses in Foundations of Christian Social Thought.”
Primacorp was granted the lion’s share - 95% - of profits from four online majors it was going to market and manage for King’s. The idea was that Primacorp would spend millions of dollars marketing the online programs. Thousands would attend those programs and drive hundreds to enroll in person at King’s, lifting all boats and creating a stronger business model for King’s.
During staff meetings in the fall of 2021, King’s and Primacorp introduced dozens of new staff members who were hired to market the four online majors, adding staffing costs before those programs were fully ready to launch and promote.
Conflicts in a Partnership
King’s administrators and faculty members said that Peter Chung in particular pushed ludicrously optimistic targets of enrolling 10,000 students in the online majors within 18 months. Grinding battles over contracts and partnership terms took place between King’s and Primacorp executives. Some administrators and faculty pushed back on Chung’s goals and demanded King’s retain its rigorous, high quality approach in-person and online, according to several sources.
The King’s faculty and staff did roll out dozens of online courses and started to see growing enrollment in the online programs, but not at the breakneck pace Chung wanted and not fast enough to cover the ballooning costs. King’s in-person enrollment also showed signs of strength heading into the 2023 admissions cycle.
Primacorp also violated the terms of its partnership agreement and took control of King’s board within the first 18 months of the partnership. Primacorp appointed Stockwell Day - former Minister of Labour, Social Services and Finance in Canada and leader of the Alliance - to the Board of Trustees in October 2021. Day has a history of working as a consultant with Primacorp and Chung, thus creating a direct conflict of interest.
Day became the Vice Chairman one month after joining the board, then took the role of Chairman in January 2022 after the departure of Tim Dunn. Four additional Primacorp-appointed board members were added in April 2022: Rodney Bergen, Jim Cunningham, Soon Chung and Marvin Kehler.
The partnership’s legal agreement was set to continue for decades.
“TKCO provides various marketing, student recruitment, enrollment management and fundraising services to the College under an agreement expiring in April 2051,” the 2021 990 tax form reads. “Fees for these services began with the Summer 2021 term and are calculated based on 15% of tuition revenue, net of institutional aid and refunds.”
Under the name “TKCO,” Primacorp also made a real estate bet on King’s and took out a $10 million line of credit on DeVos Hall.
“During the year ended August 31, 2021, the College obtained a revolving line of credit up to $10,000,000 from an organization related to TKCO, Burnaby Investments, LLC,” the 990 tax form stated. “The revolving line of credit is secured by College property.”
The King’s College owns only one property: the on-campus housing location, DeVos Hall, on 102 Greenwich Street. In the summer of 2022, King’s announced that they were putting the building up for sale and moving all on-campus students to their leased Brooklyn housing. As of the latest updates, it still hasn’t been sold.
Pushing out a President
By August of 2022, under Chung’s influence, the board pushed out King’s president Tim Gibson. The announcement came as a surprise to the student body, who weren’t notified of the change before an email was sent out on Aug. 11. Staff and faculty were notified only the morning before the formal announcement email.
“I had no idea. I found out with the emails,” said Student Body President Mattilyn Winburn. “Actually, I wasn't even checking my email so I found out with people texting me. I was like, ‘Let me check my email.’ Then I read it… I feel like some heads-up would have been great.”
The board appointed Day as Interim President upon Gibson’s termination. In addition to his political career, Day also previously served as a strategic advisor for a law firm, an assistant pastor and Christian school principal and was a commentator on CBC’s Power and Politics. Day was expelled from the political commentary show for making some clunky remarks on race.
With the addition of Day, the school’s Board of Trustees included a majority of five Primacorp-connected members, despite the conditions outlined in King’s tax forms.
King’s unaudited 990 2021 tax forms state that “the College entered in various agreements… with an organization, TKC Operations, Inc. (TKCO), which is a subsidiary of Primacorp Ventures, Inc. TKCO has the ability to nominate for election a non-majority four of the nine trustees of the College. In accordance with the current bylaws and the agreements with TKCO, board membership consists of nine members, four of which were elected after being nominated by TKCO.”
With a Board of Trustees currently composed of eight members (not including John Beckett as an Emeritus), this gave Primacorp a significant majority in the executive decisions that determined the future of the college.
Chung’s strategy came back to bite Primacorp, and King’s, as online enrollment numbers trickled in far below Chung’s predictions over the next year. Equally prompt layoffs of the Primacorp-packed admissions and marketing teams became part of the school’s “right-sizing” efforts in Fall 2022 as the momentum of the King’s-Primacorp partnership screeched to a halt, all within days of Chung facing scrutiny by Canadian media for his CDI College holdings.
The King’s Crossover program shut down after Fall 2022, and the non-credit certificates never launched. In mid-November, the school announced a “right-sizing” initiative that included a string of cost cuts such as eliminating five of 28 faculty positions, reducing the physical footprint of King’s and aiming for a student body of 385 students at maximum in the future. The online program seemed to be over. Primacorp was backing off its agreement.
“I absolutely do feel that a small online program is attainable, however, it would only help if the current revenue split was removed,” said one former leader of the online programs of King’s who left in 2022. “I don’t know what the thought process was with a 95/5 revenue split, but it wasn’t in King’s best interests. Industry standard is 50/50, while the highest I have ever seen is 70/30.”
A January Surprise
The situation worsened as faculty and students returned from the Christmas break and prepared to start the spring semester.
In a “Welcome Back” meeting on Jan. 19, King’s administrators broke the news to the student body that the college made several major cuts to its budget. Interim President Day told students that faculty at King’s would eventually be shifted to renewable one-year contracts and would likely not receive raises in coming years. He initially didn’t mention that the school might merge or close.
“I’m still cautiously optimistic,” senior and president of the King’s Debate Society Evan Louey-Dacus said upon hearing the news. “I like Interim President Day, but I know that he has a significant amount of political experience. When I hear something that he says that encourages me, I wonder if it’s actually encouraging or if it’s just because he knows how to play the game.”
Dean of Students David Leedy told students during the meeting that the school reduced the hours that the campus is open on weeknights. It also closed the O’Keeffe Student Union to students with the exception of pre-reserved events. King’s stopped providing food at most college-sponsored events, including free Chick-fil-A sandwiches after the weekly Public Reading of Scripture schoolwide gathering on Mondays. The school reduced student life funds for its House system, and cut most student-led organization budgets in half.
A week later, on Jan. 30, the school revealed an urgent $2.6 million funding gap for the Spring 2023 semester in a “community update.” Students, staff, faculty and alumni began rallying small-donor fundraising campaigns to try to reach the $2.6 million target and make it to the end of the semester.
Some students also created the “TKC Letters” project to document the impact of King’s in the words of staff, faculty, students and alumni. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in donations began rolling into the college from alumni, friends and fans of the college.
“Before King’s, there were few ideas or people that I felt were worth fighting for,” said junior Elizabeth Kelly in her letter. “Now, there are things worth swearing, hoping, and caring for, and I think this school is one of them.”
Several other colleges signed NDA agreements to consider acquiring or partnering with King’s, with provosts and presidents from a host of unnamed colleges frequently walking the halls of King’s with various members of King’s administration.
Other colleges, including Wheaton University, Biola University and Messiah University, showed up to the school for a transfer fair at the invitation of King’s administrators and hosted tables in King’s lobby to recruit students from King’s seeking backup or transfer options.
Some students started receiving overdue rent notices at their doors from building management at the remaining on-campus housing location, the Azure Building in Brooklyn, addressed to The King’s College and asserting that the school fell behind on paying its bills. King’s assured students in multiple emails that “this notice… poses no legal risk to you or change in the status of your housing situation.”
“The notice we received was a surprise and definitely confusing since we hadn’t heard anything about housing concerns beforehand,” said sophomore Meghan Huberty.
Interim Provost Dr. Matthew Parks then announced to students that the college was preparing for the “worst-case scenario” – namely, closure – and organized handshake transfer agreements to provide current students with other options for completing their education.
When asked how likely it will be for King’s to close, Parks said, “I'm not going to try to speak to that directly except to say that we need something to change. That's what the partnership conversations are about. That's what the fundraising efforts are about. That's what we're praying about and working on every front.”
Each major department at King’s hosted a “Program Meeting” in which both Parks and Director of Curriculum and Academic Advising Danise Stokehold discussed ideal transfer options for each major.
A Wave of Publicity
A reporter from The New York Times attended the program meeting of the Journalism, Culture and Society program in March and wrote a March piece about the college’s impending doom. In the piece he quoted students such as freshman Eli Johnson saying, “My plan is to stay in the city whether or not King’s is still here. Where better to love and serve people? It is the highest density of people of every background. Where better to thrive?”
Throughout the spring semester, stories in publications ranging from The Empire State Tribune to InsiderHigherEd, ReligionUnplugged.com, the Brooklyn Paper and ChristianityToday also spotlighted King’s precipitous state, showcasing its unusual profile as a rigorous but small liberal arts college in the heart of New York City.
Throughout February and March, staff, faculty and students at King’s came together regularly in prayer for the school, uncertain whether they would even be paid and able to offer classes through the end of the semester.
Faculty members then confirmed that the school received a $2 million loan from Peter Chung. Administration refused to confirm or deny the information behind this loan, but confirmed that the school now had the funding to pay faculty through July and staff through May. The loan guaranteed that the college could finish the 2022-2023 school year, move forward with graduation and pay outstanding debts.
The loan offer came within days of the press pointing to Chung as a primary culprit in the current saga of King’s. In an email on Friday, March 3, King’s stated it “received bridge financing that will provide us with funds to ensure that we can fulfill our financial obligations to faculty and staff through the end of the semester.”
Or so students, faculty, staff, parents and donors thought. The administration then stated in a faculty meeting that the $2 million, along with $250,000 in fundraising and more promised, did not include the student housing debt; in fact, King’s needed $1.2 million more to cover the outstanding debt to The Azure building.
The loan provided peace of mind that the semester could finish, that seniors could receive their diplomas and that faculty and staff would be compensated. However, the details of the loan left many feeling cynical.
“The lack of transparency from this administration has lots of students, including myself, questioning the integrity of the school as a whole and the truth of the financial situation,” said sophomore Kayleigh Burrell.
A battle over the narrative also reached a boiling point in April as Interim President Day continued to assert that King’s problems were rooted in history pre-dating Primacorp and its founder and CEO, Chung. Meanwhile, many staff, faculty and students believed that, while King’s history matters to the narrative, the current dire scenario was caused largely by Day, Chung and Primacorp.
The 11th Hour
As the spring semester continued, King’s tried to maintain the illusion that things were going back to normal. Interregnum XIX continued as planned and was still advertised as mandatory for all King’s students, even those already making transfer plans.
The Student Body President election for the next academic year also moved forward with sophomore Shayley Burroughs as the only candidate on the ballot. Participating students elected Burroughs by vote of confidence on April 12.
King’s Executive Committee planned to accelerate courses for first-semester seniors with 21 or fewer credits left who would otherwise have to transfer and likely end up a year or so behind schedule to graduate. As a result, the “graduating class” of 2023 includes students from four different graduating terms.
“We have 111 graduates this year,” said Events Manager Valeria Martinez. “18 are FA-22 grads, 64 are SP-23 grads, 5 are SU-23 grads, and 24 are FA-23 (now graduating w/ the teach out) grads.”
With public interest on King’s increasing by April, The Middle States Commission on Higher Education, King’s accreditor, then stepped in by asking for a “show cause” report after a routine re-accreditation process happened to fall in the middle of King’s financial turmoil.
Then, on April 21, The King’s College announced it officially ended its partnership with Primacorp Ventures and switched out members of the Board of Trustees.The four board members connected to Primacorp now no longer serve on the school’s board. However, unlike the other Primacorp-connected board members, Day stayed on as interim president after that announcement.
The school then introduced eight new members of King’s Board of Trustees, making the board 11 members in total not including the interim president.
The eight new board members are Andrew “Andy” Mills, John Beckett, John Urban, Matt Dieterle, Steve French, Bethany Pickett Shah, Alexandra Harrison Gaiser and Christopher Ross. Of these new trustees two are previous board members, two are parents of current students, one is an alumnus of Northeastern Bible College and three are King’s alumni from its NYC campuses (in order, respectively.)
The Executive Committee repeatedly consoled students with statements about the accelerated summer course options for some juniors, as well as the school’s willingness to help students transfer in the case it closes, but the administration has yet to deliver any concrete decision about whether King’s will stay open past the summer.
An email sent out by the Executive Committee on May 4 stated that “the Board has selected May 31, 2023, as a deadline to raise sufficient funds in order to continue operations through the 2023-2024 academic year. Based on recent budgetary needs, that amount could be as great as $12 million.”
Based on the success of this fundraising goal that is nearly five times as much as the initial $2.6 million funding gap, King’s will decide on May 31 “whether to continue operations for the 2023-2024 academic year.”
A Final Graduation?
At commencement on May 6, faculty donned their academic regalia and graduates their caps and gowns as the Class of 2023 received their degrees. Three co-valedictorians spoke from the pulpit at the historic St. George’s Episcopal Church about their experience at King’s and how the school shaped their life and character, beyond just knowledge.
Day then introduced commencement speaker Christopher Scalia, son of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. Day and interim board chair Henry G. Morriello referenced the dire financial situation of King’s during the proceedings.
“If you believe in God, you believe in miracles,” Morriello told the audience, referencing the college’s future.
“Today’s ceremony is an incredible tribute to the unique resilience of this class,” Moriello said to the graduates and the hundreds of friends and family members in attendance. “I have been amazed by all of you. I admire you and your commitment to your Lord and to your college.”
Two days after graduation, on Monday, May 8, Stockwell Day resigned from his position as interim president according to an email from King’s. His replacement as the next interim president is one of the newly appointed board members, Steven French. French is a long-time non-profit and ministry executive and an alumnus of Northeastern Bible College, which closed in 1990 and later merged into King’s.
The school announced that an anonymous group of donors would match up to $100,000 of fundraising by Tuesday, May 9. An email from King’s on May 10 announced that the fundraising match was exceeded.
“I wish The King’s College all the best. It has a unique mission. It’s attempting to bring an academically rigorous and distinctively Christian higher education option to one of the great cultural capitals of the world: New York City,” wrote Warren Smith in February, a former consultant to King’s and a parent of a King’s alumnus. “The loss of The King’s College would be a hard blow to New York City and to evangelicalism.”
Melinda Huspen completed her junior year at The King’s College in NYC and is the Managing Editor of The Empire State Tribune.
Mandie Beth-Chau completed her freshman year at The King’s College and is the Campus Editor at The Empire State Tribune.
Joshua Story completed his junior year at The King’s College NYC and is the Humor Columnist at The Empire State Tribune.
This piece was reported as a final project in the business reporting class at The King’s College in New York. King’s Professor of Journalism Paul Glader, who is also executive editor at ReligionUnplugged.com, contributed reporting and editing.