UNH TASK FORCES FILES (last updated, 8/18/95) This and the other files in this folder will be updated repeatedly with additions and revisions as the UNH task forces do their work during the summer and fall of 1995. Any member of the UNH community is invited to read and comment; comments should be addressed to task force members, whose telephone, fax, mail, and e-mail addresses head each file. The following sections of this file, describing the rationale for the work of the task forces, the targets and timetables, and the specific charges, are adapted from the memo to the University community from Walter Eggers, dated June 19, 1995. Rationale "We face problems of such magnitude that it is clear we must make some fundamental changes in the way we do the business of the University. Unless we address these problems now with a permanent restructuring of revenues and expenditures, deficits will continue, we will face further taxes and freezes, and we will always be hedging and revising our plans. "The primary objective of all the task forces working together is to remedy a current budget shortfall resulting from level state funding, a decline in tuition revenue (from proportionally fewer out-of-state students), and increasing costs of financial aid. These problems are now "structural," built into our budgets as assumptions about revenue and expenditures for the future. Carrying funds forward from the freeze on expenditures this year and using of other one-time funds, we will manage to cover this shortfall in FY'96. But these one-time funds will give out by FY'97. This is to say, we have only a matter of months to balance the budget with permanent cuts or new revenues. "For FY'97 the shortfall will range upwards from $3.5 million, depending on what salary raises are awarded this year. In these circumstances it seems prudent to plan against the worst, and projecting the current trend in tuition revenues we can expect as much as $8 million of deficit moving into FY'98. Beyond the numbers that we can project, the general issue for the task forces is whether we can restructure our budget for the future so as to be able to contain rising costs within reasonable assumptions about revenue. "In my view, we are best off making fundamental changes now if the alternative is to cope with new deficits year after year. Our planning should focus on the quality of education we offer our students, and instead we have been preoccupied with costs and expenses. For the sake of what is central and most important to our mission as a university, we should at this point deliberately diminish the size and scope of our activities. In the early '90's we could hope to stay ahead of ourselves by growing the student body and bringing in more tuition revenue. In 1991, we created a program of tuition discounts for honors-profile out-of-state students (Deans' Scholarships), and this helped us become the New England public university of choice for undergraduates. Now all of our competitors market themselves in this way, and we are having a hard time affording competitive discounts. We can no longer project increasing revenues that will mask rising costs; any new expenditures will require reallocation. "To maintain the advantages we gained as we grew enrollments at the undergraduate and graduate level (and even to maintain those enrollments), we must insure that our students get the quality of education they deserve. To maintain quality means developing the capacity to reallocate strategically. As long as we are coping with deficits, we will be unable to invest in the continuing new costs of a contemporary university education--in computing and information technology, in new library services, and in laboratory equipment, to use some obvious current examples. If we hope to develop as a university, we will have bills to pay well beyond the deficits we project in coming years." Targets and Timetables "In order to distribute the deficits we anticipate, the Finance Office attributed current year expenditures to the domains of the several task forces and then projected the percentages of current expenditures to cover a total of $8 million," as follows: Academic Programs $3,893,889 Central Support Services 755,883 including Utilities 400,151 Administrative and Personnel Functions 948,136 Research Support and Related PAU's 645,937 Student Support Services 274,867 including Student Financial Aid 932,132 Advancement Services 149,006 $8,000,001 "These figures will serve as targets. We recognize that the task forces and their targets will overlap and that we have made some rather arbitrary assignments--note, for example, that staff positions that support academic and other programs have been incorporated in Administrative and Personnel Functions, that student financial aid has been separately identified but associated with Student Support Services, and that the cost of utilities has been separately identified but associated with Central Support Services. Even after staff support has been removed from academic programs, the target for that task force is by far the largest. Recognizing that any change in academic programs will take the most time to implement, in that case only, though the plan must yield the full amount targeted, that plan may be implemented over three years, FY'97 through FY'99." In addition to the task forces, two already existing committees have been asked to follow the same timetable and prepare additional recommendations on (1) athletic programs and (2) summer school and the academic calendar. "We expect that the task forces will begin their work with a first round of meetings during the week of June 19. It seems likely that early in the process of their deliberations the task forces will need considerable support from Institutional Research and other central administrative offices; those offices have been alerted and will respond to any requests from the task force chairs. At this point the original schedule for recommendations through the Planning Council and to the President seems optimistic but feasible. The task forces will report recommendations to the Planning Council by the end of September; the Planning Council will report recommendations to the President by the end of October; the President will make decisions, seek approval as necessary from the Trustees, and direct the implementation of changes from FY'97 and beyond by January 1, 1996. Certain trustees have already indicated their support of this process and their willingness to consider a whole package of proposed changes at the same time." Task Force References and Documentations Throughout this process, the chairs of the task forces will together constitute a "steering committee" to insure good communication. As particular studies are prepared for the use of the task forces (usually by the Office of Institutional Research), they will be identified and listed under a heading called "In- House Studies" below. As readings of potential common value are identified and circulated, they, too, will be listed under a heading called "Common Readings" below. Anyone interested in receiving hard copies of the studies and readings should contact any task force chair, the Office of Academic Affairs, or the Reference Desk in Dimond Library. In-House Studies "UNH Organizational Chart" (July 1995). "Big Increase in High School Graduates Seen," The Chronicle (Oct. 13, 1993). NH Public High School Graduates, 1973-74 to 2008-09 (Institutional Research) 1995. New England States - Public HS Graduates, 1973-74 to 2008-09 (Institutional Research) 1995. Northeast Region - Public HS Graduates, 1973-74 to 2008- 09 (Institutional Research) 1995. NH Births Plus 18 Years (Institutional Research) 1995. Memo Re: Population Projections for Massachusetts (Institutional Research) 10/27/94. Memo Re: Steady as She Goes - A Course for the 90's (Institutional Research) 6/17/92. Memo Re: Enrollment Comparison - NE Land Grants (Institutional Research) 12/13/94. New England land-Grant Universities - Tuition, fees, room/board survey (Institutional Research) 7/3/95. Admissions Trends at the 6 NE State Universities & Land-Grant Colleges, Fall 1987 to Fall 1994 (Institutional Research) 1/31/95 - 6 pages. Financial Aid in the University System of NH: A Critical Resource (USNH) 1995. Memo Re: Increases in Students' Costs & Financial Aid (Judy Ray) 11/3/94. UNH - Financial Aid 1995-1996 (David Kraus) 1995. Student Support Services, Budget & Actual Expenditures, FY93, FY94,FY95 (Barbara Montgomery) 1995. Student Support Services, Positions for FY93,FY94,& FY95 Budgeted in Fund 1000 (Barbara Montgomery) 1995. Sources of Information Students Receive (Erick Berglund) 1995. Common Readings Eaton, Judith S. "Investing in American Higher Education: An Argument for Restructuring," Council for Aid to Education(January 5, 1995) Johnson, Sandra L., and Sean C. Rush, ed. Reinventing the University: Managing and Financing Institutions of Higher Education (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1994). Kittredge, Clare. "Trustee vote has far-reaching impact,"Boston Globe (June 25, 1995). Wadsworth, Deborah. "The New Public Landscape: Where Higher Education Stands," AAHE Bulletin (June, 1995). Heffner, Stephen. "URI faces budget crunch," The Providence Journal (May 12, 1995). Manforte, Tracy. "Budget Task Forces get set to recommend cuts at UNH," Union Leader (June 23, 1995). Perspectives "A Calling to Account," Special Issue (July 1995). Matthews, George J. and Curry, John A. "Back to the Drawing Board", Trusteeship (May/June 1995). , Smiley, Jane. "The Common Wisdom", MOO (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995). "Most NH Cities lost population since 1990," Fosters Daily Democrat (2/10/94). "Hispanic dropouts worry educators", Boston Sunday Globe (10/16/94). "Recession brought exodus from region", Boston Sunday Globe (3/12/95). "Taking the road out of Rhode Island", Boston Sunday Globe (11/6/94). "A Message From Fleet's Student Loan Specialist.." David Kraus (1995). Groff, Warren H.; Robert G."Strategic Planning & Management". Report of the Annual Management Institute for College and University Executives (10th, Snowmass, Colorado, July 21-26, 1985). Lewis, Darrell R.; Kallsen, Lincoln A., "Using Multiattribute Evaluation Techniques for Assisting Reallocation Decisions in Higher Education", ASHE Annual Meeting Paper, Draft, November, 1993. Lincoln, Yvonna S.; Tuttle, Jane, Centrality as a Prior Criterion, Georgia State University, Atlanta, October, 1983. Paper presented at the Joint Meeting of the Association for the Study of Higher Education and the American Educational Research Association, Division J, San Francisco, CA, October, 1983. Hooker, Michael K., "Restructuring a University", New England Board of Higher Education, Spring, 1995. "The Research University in a Time of Discontent", edited by Cole, Jonathan R., Barber, Elinor G., and Graubard, Stephen R., the Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994.