Education

VCU has eliminated jobs and changed its admissions process in response to recent federal directives to roll back diversity, equity and inclusion and affirmative action standards.

The university’s Board of Visitors provided formal approval for those steps as well as an updated six-year capital plan at its meeting last week. The board also voted to increase the tuition rate by 2.5% in the upcoming academic year.

VCU is currently anticipating a budget shortfall of $16.2 million in FY26, and said it was weighing a variety of strategies to close the gap.

VCU is planning to renovate nearly 18,000 square feet of space in the Cary & Belvidere Residential College to make way for a new headquarters and event venue for its catering operations.

The first phase will be financed primarily by the pending sale of the 6.6-acre Sports Backers Stadium site to the Richmond EDA for $25 million.

Franchisees Alisa and Brad McKeiver last month opened the region’s first location of Ivybrook Academy at 480 Winter Place Way in Powhatan.

Included in the multi-year renovations were improvements to the school’s moot courtroom, where students participate in mock trials.

The 64-bed, four-building complex will be the school’s first new dorm in about a decade and comes amid growing enrollment at the college.

The company known for its employees in yellow jackets, is in the final weeks of a security contract with VCU and VCU Health, which have hired Sentry Force Security to handle the job starting in mid-August.

School may be out of session, but the Northside private school is keeping busy this summer with a seven-figure deal that adds an acre to its campus.