Higher education’s
thinking partner.
Ask Athena anything about your institution’s financial health, peer position, or enrollment outlook. The answer arrives in ninety seconds — peer-calibrated, source-cited, and board-ready.
Your Composite Financial Index stands at 2.14 for FY 2024 — placing you in the 58th percentile of a Statistical Match of ten comparable masters’-large institutions in the Mid-Atlantic.
The trend has steepened since FY22. Holding enrollment flat, I project CFI of 1.82 by FY27 — still above the SACSCOC threshold, but narrowing the buffer your Board…
Your peers are planning for a future you haven’t modeled yet.
Three roles. Three calendars. The same missing chapter.
Your CFI is trending — and you can’t tell if the slope is a warning your accreditor will see first.
The Board wants a five-year plan by Tuesday. Your IR team is still assembling last year’s IPEDS.
You know enrollment will fall. You don’t know by how much, or which programs to defend first.
One advisor. Three habits. One workflow.
Compose the board-ready answer.
Ask Athena a strategic question. She returns a peer-calibrated, accreditation-aware narrative — drafted in your institution’s voice, sourced and footnoted. Ninety seconds, not six weeks.
- ✓ Cited to source rows
- ✓ SACSCOC · HLC · NEASC tone
- ✓ Drop into your Board pack
Model what happens next.
Twenty planning modules — enrollment, tuition, aid, faculty mix. Move a slider, watch the CFI bend. Every scenario arrives with a peer-calibrated narrative the Board can read.
- ✓ 20 scenario modules
- ✓ Live CFI · DSCR projections
- ✓ Board-ready narrative output
Know where you stand.
ML-matched peer groups across four thousand institutions. CFI trends for your exact Carnegie class. Benchmarking that used to take a quarter, returned in seconds — never out of date.
- ✓ 5 peer-selection methods
- ✓ Carnegie · state · mission filters
- ✓ Always-current IPEDS
Westfield University’s Composite Financial Index of 0.9 reflects a declining but actively managed financial position. The primary reserve ratio of 0.22 remains above the generally accepted floor of 0.10, indicating that the institution retains operational resilience despite the CFI declining below the 1.0 threshold in FY2024 for the first time since FY2019.
The decline is attributable to a contraction in net tuition revenue (−7.2% in real terms) and increased reliance on draw from unrestricted reserves…
| INSTITUTION | CARNEGIE | REGION | FTE | CFI | MATCH |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Your institution | M2 | MidA | 3,200 | 2.14 | — |
| Allegheny-class A | M2 | MidA | 3,100 | 2.31 | 96% |
| Hamilton-class B | M2 | NE | 3,450 | 1.98 | 93% |
| Skidmore-class C | M2 | NE | 2,980 | 2.45 | 91% |
| Wooster-class D | M2 | GLk | 3,200 | 1.72 | 88% |
| Whitman-class E | M2 | PNW | 3,310 | 2.02 | 86% |
Athena is already at every moment
of your planning year.
Higher education runs on a predictable calendar. So does Athena — ready with the right data at the right moment, before you have to ask.
Your board will ask: “How does our CFI compare to our peers? Are we on the right side of the enrollment cliff?” Athena has the answers before the retreat begins.
What discount rate can we sustain? What does a 5% enrollment drop do to our operating model? Peer benchmarks tell you whether your assumptions are defensible or dangerous.
HLC Criteria 5.A, SACSCOC Standard 13 — financial sustainability sections require ratio trend analysis, peer context, and a management response narrative. Athena generates a complete draft from your IPEDS data.
Program mix decisions, market positioning, revenue diversification — every strategic choice needs peer context. Athena maps where your peers are going so your plan goes somewhere different.
Your CFI question needs different peers
than your enrollment question.
A single static cohort gives you the wrong answer for every question. Athena rebuilds your peer group from scratch for each analysis — matching the five dimensions that actually matter to that decision.
Best for: financial benchmarking, accreditation prep.
Best for: cost structure benchmarking, staffing ratios, operating expense comparisons.
Best for: tuition pricing, discount rate, financial aid strategy.
Best for: enrollment competition, feeder school benchmarking, demographic exposure.
Best for: academic program comparison, accreditor-expected peer groups, strategic plan benchmarking.
Four convictions the field has been waiting for.
She has studied every Composite Financial Index ever published in IPEDS, every accreditation financial standard, and every enrollment pattern in fifteen years of federal data. Ask her anything. She knows your institution specifically — by name, by Carnegie class, by peer cohort.
Question in. Peer-calibrated board narrative out. One workflow.
$20K / yr · vs. $200K+ across 3 vendorsThe cliff is already affecting 40% of U.S. institutions.
High-school graduates in eighteen key states will fall fifteen to twenty-five percent by 2030. Your peers are already redrawing their fifteen-year plans against it.
See how your statistical peers are absorbing the shelf — before your next Board meeting.
Get your free benchmark report →Three ways in. One advisor at the center.
Open the Peer Atlas. Run a benchmark report. Calibrate one CFI question against ten matched peers.
- ✓ Public IPEDS data
- ✓ 10-peer Statistical Match
- ✓ One Athena CFI report
- ✓ WICHE feeder exposure
The advisor, the planning workbench, and the closed-loop narrative. Most institutions choose this.
- ✓ Unlimited Athena queries
- ✓ 20+ scenario modules
- ✓ Board-ready narrative export
- ✓ SACSCOC · HLC · NEASC tone
- ✓ All 5 peer methods
Athena, plus a private workspace your IR team owns and your Board sees — with Workday & Banner taps.
- ✓ Workday & Banner connectors
- ✓ Private workspace + SSO
- ✓ Quarterly advisory hour
- ✓ Custom peer methodology
$20K replaces what most institutions currently spend across three separate vendors and 40 hours of IR staff time.
See full pricing and feature details →See where your institution stands — in ninety seconds.
Enter your institution below. We pull your IPEDS data, match you to ten statistical peers, and return a CFI benchmark report before your next meeting.
No spam. No sales call required. Benchmark data sourced from IPEDS federal surveys.