Davis Educational Foundation Awards $100K to the CCGS / Joint Purchasing Initiative

The Davis Educational Foundation has awarded the CCGS/Joint Purchasing Initiative a $100,000 grant to be distributed over two years.  This is the third grant by the Davis Educational Foundation to underwrite this innovative and collaborative project.

The Joint Purchasing Initiative (JPI) consists of the five private member institutions of the Cooperating Colleges of Greater Springfield (CCGS) including: American International College, Bay Path University, Elms College, Springfield College, and Western New England University.  The goal of the JPI, which will continue to be administered by Bay Path University, is to identify and implement strategic opportunities for collaboration where shared purchasing and shared services in high-cost and high-impact areas will result in significant institutional cost-savings across the JPI’s partner institutions, ultimately containing the cost of higher education for students.

Since its founding in 2017, the efforts of the JPI have resulted in collective cost savings of nearly $900,000, with varying degrees of savings by institution.   During this time, the JPI reduced costs by negotiating better deals on contracted services with vendors, such as: student transportation for athletics and van leasing; rental car agreement; contract management; corporate payment systems; IRB software; employee and student background checks; electricity and solar sources of energy; interpretive and captioning services; medical waste disposal services; and computer purchases.

With the funding from the latest grant from the Davis Educational Foundation, the next step in the evolution of the JPI is to explore and develop potential plans for shared services, implement best practices, reduce duplication of efforts, and drive efficiency gains with the expertise already existing within the institutions.