University looks for ways to cut funding gap

For weeks, Southeast Missouri State University has been struggling to find a way to close the gap between a $77 million budget and only $72 million in available funding. Like all state-funded colleges and universities in Missouri, Southeast saw a large chunk of its anticipated state appropriation evaporate in the last days of the legislative session with further withholdings by Gov. Bob Holden.

To eliminate the $5 million gap, university officials have looked at dozens of ways to make ends meet. So far, the university has offset about $4.5 million through hiring delays, deferred maintenance and increases in tuition and fees.

The remaining $500,000 gap has been the subject of many discussions on the univeristy campus. Two of the meetings -- the first drew 170 participants, and last week's attendance was near 200 -- have already been held with faculty and staff members. Two more are scheduled for this week.

The main focus of these meetings is academic restructuring suggested in a financial plan already approved by the university's board of regents. Because this portion of the plan -- $500,000 out of a $70 million-plus budget -- affects jobs, programs and, ultimately, students, officials want to air all possibilities before taking final action.

So far, the reaction has been what might be expected whenever the possibility of lost jobs or combined programs are discussed in a university setting. For the most part, those attending these meetings have seemed to accept the need to find cost-cutting solutions -- just don't cut my program or job.

Included is a possible consolidation of departments, elimination of some programs or even combining one or more of the existing eight schools and colleges that operate under the university's umbrella.

So far, suggestions have been made for combining the School of Polytechnic Studies into the College of Business or into the College of Science and Mathematics. Another possible combo would put the School of University Studies and the School of Graduate Studies together. Other academic divisions at the university are the College of Education, College of Health and Human Services and the College of Liberal Arts.

Given the fact that financial pressures may very well continue into the next two or three academic years, depending on what happens to the economy and whether state revenue picks up, it has been quietly suggested on campus that it might be useful to consider a broader reorganization at the university to achieve even greater savings.

A small group of faculty members -- all with enough rank and job security to know they wouldn't be adversely affected -- have suggested privately that the university's eight schools and colleges could be merged into three groups -- business, arts and science and health and humanities -- which would create a scale of cost reductions that would not only ease the funding pressure, but also permit more investment in the university's strongest areas.

Why these suggestions, if they make sense, aren't being openly discussed at the ongoing meetings is an indication of strong reluctance on the part of the faculty to make any significant changes in the way the university operates. But this does seem to be the appropriate time to raise every possibility so that, in the end, the best choices are made.