Cross Orders UW Campuses to Prioritize Courses, Prepare for Layoffs

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — University of Wisconsin System President Ray Cross directed campuses Thursday to quickly identify signature programs to retain and brace for layoffs as the coronavirus pandemic deepens the system’s financial losses.

Cross said he wants campuses to evaluate their programs by January with an eye toward the cost, whether they are duplicated at another campus and student demand. System officials will decide which courses stay and which will be cut subject to regents approval, Cross told reporters during a video conference Wednesday afternoon.

Campuses should be ready to move forward with scaled-down course catalogs by fall 2021, Cross said. The only guarantee he could offer was each campus will continue to offer basics such as English and math that undergraduates need to earn a diploma. He said no campuses are at risk of closing but layoffs will be unavoidable. The program cuts will apply only to the system’s regional universities. UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee, the system’s two largest campuses, will be exempt.

“We’re facing some unprecedented challenges,” Cross said. “We’re trying to be responsible stewards. If we want the system to survive on the other side of this pandemic … we’ve got to act now. We just don’t have the time.”

Cross also said he wants to consolidate functions such as information technology and human resource operations by January 2022. He wants to bolster online course offerings, too, ordering the system to create four additional courses by the beginning of June.

Cross said the system has been inching along on consolidation efforts in recent years but will have to scramble now as the pandemic freezes up the economy.

The system shut down in-person classes in March, canceled all spring sports, and told students to move back home. System officials estimate the moves will result in a nearly $170 million loss for the spring semester alone. Those costs include the refunds for on-campus parking, dining, and housing, technology purchases to move classes online, payments to student workers who lost their jobs, and athletic ticket sales.

The system took another hit in April when Gov. Tony Evers ordered state agencies to reduce spending by 5% by July to save roughly $70 million. The Wisconsin State Journal reported that UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank told that school’s Faculty Senate on Monday that the system’s share of that cut will amount to $46 million to $47 million, with $20 million coming out of UW-Madison.

New budget figures released Wednesday show an $870 million drop in tax collections in April.

The situation is worsened by declining state aid for system schools. Cross said in his plan that the system’s portion of the state budget has shrunk 6% since the 2007-08 fiscal year. And Republican legislators have kept tuition for in-state undergraduates frozen since the 2013-15 state budget.