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This article was produced in partnership with The Charlotte Ledger.

In the fall of 2022, Elon University President Connie Book stepped foot on the campus of Queens University of Charlotte for the first time.

Book was there to meet with Queens’ then-president Daniel Lugo and tell him that Elon was going to open a law school campus in Charlotte’s South End. She was impressed with Queens’ Georgian Revival architecture and brick facades, and its wide and grassy open areas.

“I walked around that day, and I thought, ‘It’s so Elon-like!’” she recalled.

In the next few years, Queens could become a lot more “Elon-like,” following the announcement Tuesday that the two schools, both founded in the 1800s, are merging. 

At an event on Queens’ campus, Book and acting Queens President Jesse Cureton described the merger as building on the strengths of each institution. Queens gets a larger partner with more resources, while Elon gains a foothold in a major metropolitan area.

“This is a win for Elon, a win for Queens, and a win for Charlotte,” said Chris Marsicano, a higher education scholar at Davidson College.

Many of the details of the merger, including the name and specifics of academic programs, will be decided in the coming years, following conversations with consultants, accreditors, regulators, and faculty at both campuses, the leaders said. But Elon comes to the deal on a much stronger financial footing than its new partner, and it will control most of the merged entity’s board seats.

Though Queens has a significant presence in the Charlotte area, it is struggling financially. Many small, private schools across the country are grappling with weak enrollment as more Americans question the value of a college degree, and federal funding cuts are creating new pressures for many schools.

Queens has been running significant deficit budgets in the past decade, said college finance consultant Gary Stocker. Its operating expenses have grown 26 percent in the past decade, while operating revenues grew just 5 percent, he said. Enrollment has been falling, from almost 2,500 in 2019 to 1,850 in 2023, yet the university has a higher number of employees making over $100,000 than its peer institutions.

“This is not a growth opportunity for Queens,” Stocker said. “It’s a survival move.” 

Elon, on the other hand, has been thriving over the past 15 years, despite a decrease in this year’s freshman class. But its location in Alamance County limits its growth.

“Elon has grown rapidly, has continued its meteoric rise, and is now in a position where it’s really trying to decide: Does it want to be this sort of very strong undergraduate teaching organization that it has always been?” Marsicano said. “Does it need to extend beyond Burlington, North Carolina? Elon has unequivocally stated yes.”

Marsicano said Charlotte is not only one of the fastest growing regions in the country, but it has a population ripe for the kind of graduate programs Elon offers. “There are more people with bachelor’s degrees but not graduate degrees than just about any other city in America,” Marsicano said.

Elon had already been making moves in Charlotte, with the opening of a satellite law school campus in the bustling South End area last year. But the merger opens additional opportunities for partnerships with businesses in fields such as healthcare and tech. 

Who’s the Boss?

Although the two university presidents described the strengths of both institutions and spoke warmly of a collegial partnership, it’s clear that the Elon side of the merger will be in charge.

Book told reporters that Elon’s 37-member board will expand to add 10 members from the Queens side. That means that Elon will control nearly 80 percent of the merged entity’s board seats.

Charlotte business titan Hugh McColl Jr., the 90-year-old former CEO of Bank of America and a member of Queens’ board, indicated that Book would be in charge after the merger. “This is going to turn out to be one of the most important things that’s ever happened in this city, and it’s in your hands, young lady,” he said, gesturing to Book.

Cureton, a former banking and healthcare executive, stepped in as Queens’ acting president in July after the departure of Lugo, who left to become president of Trinity College in Connecticut. Cureton said Tuesday he would stay as long as he needed to.

Like most universities, Elon and Queens are organized as nonprofits. When nonprofits combine, there is no financial transaction; they just merge the boards and the assets.

Book downplayed the idea that Elon would take the lead. “I do believe that it is a merger of equals, in that it is two unique strengths that are coming together, and that’s what we’re focused on today,” she said. “We’re grateful to have this opportunity, and I think Queens recognizes they need Elon for their own future, too.”

More Resources, More Partnerships

Cureton said the merger is attractive because it could bring more resources to the Charlotte campus and its students.

“It gives Queens an opportunity to partner with a very solid, financially stable university and allow us to continue to invest not only in our campus, but to invest in graduate programs that we can elevate here in this community, to better partner with the business community,” he said.

Book said she’s excited about the opportunities to link Elon’s academics with Charlotte’s businesses. She said she recently met with biomedical companies about opportunities for Elon’s engineering students, and she’d like to apply Elon’s strength in artificial intelligence to Queens’ business school.

“In Charlotte, you’re on this cutting edge of innovation, whether it’s artificial intelligence and how that’s going to impact our sectors [like] health care [and] what’s happening at The Pearl,” she said, referring to the Atrium Health/Wake Forest University medical innovation campus in Charlotte. “So we want to prepare students for those opportunities. And Charlotte is like a palette of opportunity for that.”

They said current students should see no changes as a result of the merger.

Book said she first called Queens to discuss a merger last year, after Lugo announced he was leaving.

She met with Cureton, who was then the Queens board president and had a daughter at Elon. And, she said, it was the same day that Gov. Josh Stein appointed Tia Hudgins Taylor as a district court judge in Eastern North Carolina–someone who went to Queens as an undergraduate and graduated from Elon Law.

“There was just a lot of synergy in the room that day,” Book said.

Tony Mecia is the executive editor of The Charlotte Ledger.