The Daily Tar Heel
URL: http://www.dailytarheel.com/index.php/article/2011/04/uncsystem_and_university_officials_worry_about_budget_cuts_to_academic_core
Current Date: Thu, 24 May 2012 06:40:29 -0400
UNC-system and University officials worry about budget cuts to academic core
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In discussions regarding the UNC system’s inevitable reduction in state funding, administrators have repeatedly said that “protecting the academic core” remains their priority.
But after four years of cuts totaling about $600 million, provosts and faculty at universities across the system indicate that the core has already been compromised, and it could be significantly damaged this year if the Republican leadership’s proposal to reduce funding by 17.4 percent is approved.
There is not a clear definition for a university’s academic core, said Jim Martin, secretary of the UNC-system faculty assembly.
“Academic core is a word that gets thrown around a lot,” he said. “But it has been very poorly defined.”
Administrators have good intentions in trying to protect the academic core, but they also want to say they’re protecting it to look good politically, he said.
“Yes, it is rhetoric,” he said. “And yes, it is trying to mitigate the damage.”
Bruce Carney, provost and executive vice chancellor at UNC-CH, said the academic core can’t be quantitatively defined.
“The key word here is ‘academic’ — that is, the instructional mission of the University,” he said.
“We start with the undergraduate experience,” Carney said. “That would be the real core of the University.”
Carney said UNC-CH has managed to protect most of its academic core so far.
“It’s fundamentally the academic experience of the students,” Carney said. “How are the students seeing their education delivered to them?”
In previous years, other non-academic units have felt the brunt of the cuts, but all aspects of the University — including its academic core — will feel the upcoming round of budget cuts, he said.
“Everybody’s going to feel it at some level,” Carney said. “If we have 15 percent, it will be seriously damaged.”
David Perrin, provost and executive vice chancellor at UNC-Greensboro, said the university took the majority of its cuts from non-academic areas in past years of budget cuts.
“But now we have come to the place where there’s no place left to go for the cuts and be able to function as a university,” he said.
The university’s academic core comprises of courses essential for graduation, such as general education and major requirements, Perrin said.
“We’ve done a pretty good job at protecting the academic core so that we haven’t seen dramatic increases in the time required to graduate,” Perrin said.
“If this round of cuts requires us to significantly reduce allocations to the academic core, then I would expect us to begin to see increased time to graduation.”
System administrators are considering allocating funding to universities based on graduation and retention rates, he said.
Martin said enrollment growth, not just budget cuts, threatens the academic core.
“Your academic core is going to be hurt because you don’t have the resources commensurate with the growth,” he said.
“We’ve got challenges ahead of us, and I am very concerned when I look at what’s happening to our entire education system.”
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7 comments
The thing that worries me is that I am still unaware of the implications of the budget cut on my education. I am a transfer student from the state’s community college system. I have been given 2 years to finish my degree. I have my associates in science and just completed a year at the university.
I need to take summer courses to finish my degree (only because I was pushed out of the biology degree). Unlike many of the student body, transfers have to dive into a different world and figure it out within a short interval of time before deciding what they want to do.
It is equally aggravating when you find out that you are not that good at what you want to do and must adjust quickly to reduce the damage. We have been given figures of 40% retention rate and 50% on academic probation for Transfers.
These talks leave me worried about what classes might be removed based on cuts. I feel I am being squeezed and really need to be assured that I can finish my degree. If it takes me summer courses and an extra fall semester I will not be a statistic to bring the retention rate down any further.
I should clarify that what I meant in the second paragraph was that Transfer Students have a SHORTER interval of time and several classes are out of the question because they are strictly for freshmen and sophomores. With my GPA not transferring it also leaves me stuck with managing higher level courses without much cushion if something turns out bad. It also leaves me less time to get it back up to respectable levels after a disastrous semester.
I do not want to sound like I am complaining 100%. I am happy and proud to be a Tar Heel but sometimes the stress just ruins the atmosphere.
I am grateful for the opportunity given to me. I suggest that all Transfer Students be required to take a course on navigating the University and utilizing the resources of our campus. Why not the entire student body? It will increase retention rates and help students immensely.
Remember this: NOBODY comes to UNC to be average but the system sure can make you feel like there is nothing you can do about it and humble you in just 15 credit hours.
I see one particular expense that could be cut to save a lot of money.
At ITS Manning, premium coffee (green mountain, dunkin doughnuts) is provided free of charge to staff. real half-and-half along with multiple flavors of coffeemate is available in single serve containers. no powdered junk for them. tea (several premium brands) and hot chocolate are free, too. how much does this cost?
why are the students and NC taxpayers paying for this luxury?
@witness to waste… they provide coffee to people at ITS in Manning because they think its a benefit to the organization and the University, not b/c they want a luxurious workplace for staff. Coffee makes people more productive and also is an inexpensive way for the University to show that they care about their employees. Its why many many for-profit businesses provide coffee. I think you misunderstand the scale of the budget cuts and how absolutely inframarginal the cost of coffee are. $75M is the size of the proposed cut to the university… beyond last year’s cut.
I’m frustrated by your grumpiness, thoughtlessness, and failure to propose any sort of solution. To cover our gap with only cuts in coffee-mate, we would have to save 983,248,361 individual coffee-mate cups (amaretto flavored) per year…
@witness to waste… they provide coffee to people at ITS in Manning because they think its a benefit to the organization and the University, not b/c they want a luxurious workplace for staff. Coffee makes people more productive and also is an inexpensive way for the University to show that they care about their employees. Its why many many for-profit businesses provide coffee. I think you misunderstand the scale of the budget cuts and how absolutely inframarginal the cost of coffee are. $75M is the size of the proposed cut to the university… beyond last year’s cut.
I’m frustrated by your grumpiness, thoughtlessness, and failure to propose any sort of solution. To cover our gap with only cuts in coffee-mate, we would have to save 983,248,361 individual coffee-mate cups (amaretto flavored) per year…
to matt:
if .50 is being spent on each of UNC’s 32,000 employees for coffee, that works out to over $4 million a year. that’s a serious chunk of change.
a lot of business do provide coffee, but I have yet to be at one that provides the high-end stuff. part of the problem is that attitude that ‘we’re not a business and it is not our money being spent.’
a lot of business do not provide free coffee, either. as a consultant i’ll wager i have see just a few more places than you have.
For the record, I have taught at UNc Asheville for 13 years, and I have never been given a free cup of coffee. In fact, I pay premium prices to buy it from the private food service provider on campus.
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