Campus Budget
Update on Advocacy, Federal Stimulus, and Reorganization
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April 2, 2009
To: Campus Community
RE: Advocacy, Federal Stimulus and ReorganizationThere’s been much activity over the last few weeks, and I wanted to keep my promise to share as much information as possible and keep the campus up to date.
Advocacy Efforts
This week, we launched a comprehensive effort to enhance our advocacy for UMass Amherst, and I want to share with you some of the details. First, we wrote to more than 6,000 parents of our current students through a targeted email campaign, and encouraged them to join our UMass Amherst Advocates network. We asked these parents to contact their state senators and representatives and Gov. Patrick in support of the governor’s budget proposal to use the federal stimulus money to support higher education as a way to mitigate fee increases. We’ve received several positive responses to this effort.
Yesterday, we sent a similar message to more than 40,000 in-state alumni, encouraging them to voice their support for UMass Amherst and to join this network to advocate for the institution with their elected officials. The webpage for this network is at www.umass.edu/advocates , and I encourage every member of the campus community to become advocates for our university. Later this month, faculty and students from campus will be on Beacon Hill advocating for higher education, and we have provided support to this effort. Working together, we can make a strong case that this institution is critical to our state’s future, and that support for public higher education is a wise investment for the Commonwealth.
FEDERAL STIMULUS and REORGANIZATION
We are thankful for and supportive of Gov. Patrick’s leadership in securing federal stimulus funding for higher education and the campus. At the same time the reality of the situation is that we will not know precisely how much funding will be coming to campus until we have a legislative budget later this summer. Everyone in state government – echoing remarks from President Obama on the national level -- has cautioned us not to count on the stimulus money as a solution to our current financial crisis, and has urged us to proceed with the cuts needed to reduce our budgets to a level supportable by the Commonwealth. The Governor himself and the Secretary of Education have repeatedly stated that the stimulus funding is not a panacea, and just this week Speaker DeLeo stated unequivocal ly that agencies receiving stabilization funding for two years would be making a grave mistake if they do not prepare for a future of lower state appropriations.
Heeding the cautions of our state and national leaders, I am proceeding with our budgetary plans, including our plans for reorganization. I have agreed that further study is required in some portions of the reorganization plan, but I also believe we must act now to reduce administrative costs where we can.
The portions of the reorganization now planned will ultimately enable us to reallocate close to $2 million in base funding that had been spent on administrative overhead in the colleges and in the provost and chancellor’s offices. This funding will be redirected to increase faculty lines and to support graduate education. While the stabilization funding could make this reallocation possible through attrition and reassignment rather than layoffs, the savings will occur. As I have said numerous times, our administration must do better to support our faculty, and we must be more efficient in that support. I believe that growing and improving support for the faculty is critical to our overall institutional success, and in any area where we can redirect significant resources to this goal, we must do so. To argue for the status quo is to argue against redirecting this funding and against the best interests of the institution. Moreover, as most faculty and administrators in NSM and NRE have confirmed, there are great advantages in teaching, research, and scholarship that will result from a consolidation of science departments under one dean.
One of the concerns about reorganization is the presumed deleterious impact it could have on the humanities, fine arts, and social sciences. If we proceed with the proposed reorganization, I have pledged to allocate additional funding directly to these areas in support of scholarship, travel, and other related needs. As I said in announcing this plan, the perception of “rich” and “poor” sides of campus must not continue if we are to pull together as an institution to achieve our collective goals.
As I have said repeatedly, reorganization must not only save money, but also position us for the future. Our current course does much to place departments and faculty in proximity to improve our curriculum by creating new and exciting programs, courses and interdisciplinary offerings for our students and prospective students. The federal stimulus money is good news because of the opportunity it provides us to make necessary changes in a way that protects the dedicated people that work here. As an administration, we must adhere to both our internal goals, as well as the charge of state and federal leaders, and make changes that are critically important to our future.
