Several former Notre Dame College employees and others hope to restart a school on the site of the former college in South Euclid, which closed in spring 2024.
Members of Friends of Notre Dame College, a group which is still pending its nonprofit status, held a meet and greet Thursday night to discuss their ambitions. Trustee Peter Corrigan, a former professor at the college, said their hope is to raise money to purchase at least a portion of the nearly 50 acres of land in South Euclid to start a small college. He said they have identified several potential private investors.
"The private investors want to... have sort of a public-private partnership. They will negotiate it with us and have us reopen the school or reopen a subset of the school, a component of the school, and get started," Corrigan explained. "Then the private investors want to have a public-private partnership where they actually open up housing, they take advantage of the administration building being on the National Historic Register, (and) they redo some of the dorms."
Corrigan and fellow Friends of Notre Dame College Trustees Len Barker and Justin Tisdale previously sued Notre Dame College's former board, seeking to try to negotiate down the college's debt on its behalf. They allege the college was mismanaged and did not need to close. Former college leadership said the college had too much debt and was struggling with finances after years of enrollment decline, a plight facing many smaller colleges across the country. The group has since dropped its suit.
Tisdale, president of South Euclid City Council, said the community lost vitality when the college closed.
"That's one thing the community loved about Notre Dame, is that they were able to walk their dogs and play on the grass and play in the turf, and now you can't do that and so it's important that the school is open back up to the community, not just for educational purposes, but to South Euclid as a whole," he said.
Joe Carney, attorney for Friends of Notre Dame College, said the group hopes to raise as much money as possible. He estimated at least $2 million would be a good starting place, but said upward of $10 million could be needed.
Bud Burkle, a trustee of Friends of Notre Dame College and former pitching coach for the college's baseball team, said society needs small colleges. He added that many students desire the one-on-one attention they received at Notre Dame College, and noted athletic scholarships helped many students attend college.
"I mean, some of the kids who were in the sports programs when the school closed, they didn't go back to college, because the opportunity wasn't there," he said.
A federal judge recently appointed a receiver for the Notre Dame College property, to allow it to be sold off to settle its debt. But a lawsuit by the Ohio Attorney General continues, alleging the college's leaders illegally spent money from its endowment fund on operations.
