Piedmont International University plans to merge with financially troubled Tennessee Temple University of Chattanooga, Tenn., the third time since 2004 that PIU has merged with another Christian college.
Piedmont’s board of trustees approved the merger on Monday, and TTU’s board of trustees approved the measure on Tuesday. If the Transactional Association of Christian Colleges and Schools approves it, the merger will officially take place on April 30 and TTU will close its Chattanooga campus on May 1.
Piedmont President Charles Petitt said the merger would benefit both schools.
“These two schools have a remarkably similar histories and vertically identical missions,” Petitt said in a video posted on Piedmont’s website. “That is teaching people the Bible and training them to be effective in life and in ministry.”
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Pettit said in a telephone interview that the planned merger is similar to a marriage, and not like most mergers, where there are winners and losers.
“And it’s not like the death of a spouse where the other one is left with only the assets,” Petitt said. “It’s like a marriage where one mate may have to move and change a name, but no person disappears.”
Petitt said he expects that many of the 265 students enrolled at TTU will transfer to Piedmont’s Winston-Salem campus at 420 S. Broad St.
Piedmont had an enrollment of 567 students in the 2013-14 academic year.
“I don’t know how many will move,” Petitt said. “It’s up to them.”
Piedmont has established the Tennessee Temple Scholarship, which would cut tuition for TTU students by one-third, Petitt said. TTU online students will be taught online by Piedmont faculty members at a reduced cost, as well, he said.
Petitt also expects Piedmont to hire seven full-time TTU faculty members and a small number of its administrators as well, Petitt said. Piedmont will move Temple’s Baptist seminary to its campus.
Petitt received a doctorate in divinity from the Temple Baptist Seminary in 2002, according to his biography.
Piedmont International merged with Atlantic Baptist Bible College of Chester, Va., in 2008. At that time, 13 Atlantic students transferred to Piedmont, which was known then as Piedmont Baptist College and Graduate School of Winston-Salem. Atlantic closed, and its 40-acre campus was sold.
Piedmont merged with Spurgeon Baptist Bible College of Mulberry, Fla., in 2004.
The merger between Piedmont and TTU will lead to some layoffs of TTU administrators and staff, said Petitt and Steve Echols, the president of Tennessee Temple.
Echols will serve as an executive vice president at Piedmont.
Many TTU administrators have found jobs, Echols said. TTU has about 200 employees consisting of administrators, staff members, faculty and coaches.
Most TTU students were shocked when they learned that their school planned to close, Echols said.
“After the students got the news, they were very distraught,” he said.
TTU, which was founded in 1946, has seen its enrollment drop significantly over the past 30 years, according to news reports. TTU officials had planned to move from the old 21-acre campus in Chattanooga to Woodland Park Baptist Church in Tyner, Tenn.
However, less than 1 percent of its 17,000 alumni donated money to the university’s $2 million campaign to move the school, according to news reports. The university raised only $65,000, and it couldn’t afford to move to Woodland Park Baptist, Echols said.
TTU also is saddled with rising costs of maintaining its current campus, he said. Merging with Piedmont International makes financial sense, Echols added.
“When God closed one door, he opened another door with Piedmont International University,” he said.
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