Cuts in federal spending on research and small increases in state appropriations for higher education will mean belt-tightening and higher tuition, NU President Jeffrey Gold told the UNL Faculty Senate Tuesday, May 6
Gold said the NU system has lost 74 federal grants since President Trump’s inauguration in January. Those grants totaled $91.6 million, about half of which consisted of unfinished work. The system for awarding new grants, he said, has slowed to a crawl, which will slow the arrival of new grant money.
On top of the reductions in grants, the federal government has capped at 15 percent what it will pay for facilities and administration – F and A – associated with the grants. That will mean an additional loss of $60 million in revenue, Gold said.
As the Faculty Senate was meeting, the Nebraska Legislature was giving first-round approval to a budget that will increase state spending on NU by only 0.65 percent for each of the next two years.
Gold said the Board of Regents had requested a 3.5 percent increase in state aid. Gov. Jim Pillen had wanted to slash 2 percent from what the state spent on the university, cutting the state’s appropriation of $700 million by more than $14 million. Gold said university administrators and regents had worked to restore the original request. Recent estimates, however, from the Nebraska Economic Forecasting Advisory Board said state revenues would be lower than previously expected. The grimmer revenue outlook led the Legislature to reduce the increase in spending on the university
Because of the diminished federal and state revenue, the university probably will increase tuition rates, Gold said. For every dollar in revenue cuts, the university would have to increase tuition by $2 to make up the difference, he said.
During a question-and-answer session, professor Richard Leiter asked Gold about proposed changes to Regents Bylaws that would allow the system president to make changes to academic programs in consultation with campus leaders. Leiter asked what “consultation” was contemplated and whether it would include the Academic Planning Committee. Gold said the consultation would be very broad and include input from faculty, students, regents, faculty committees, contributors and others who have an interest in the university.
Professor Aaron PeeksMease of the sociology department asked what the administration was planning to do in connection with the Resolution to Establish a Mutual Defense Compact (see Attachment 1) initiated by faculty at Rutgers University and approved by the UNL Faculty Senate at its April 1 meeting.
Gold said NU along with other Big Ten administrators have chosen not to respond at this time. He said while all agree on the need to protect academic freedom and institutional integrity, some of the language in the resolution seemed problematic. Specifically, Gold said administrators were reluctant to commit money to defend actions taken or programs created by institutions over which they had no control.
The Senators later approved a related resolution (see Attachment 2) responding to the U.S. Department of Education’s “dear colleague” letter of Feb. 14. That letter accused U.S. educational institutions of discriminating against students on the basis of race under the guise of programs to promote diversity, equity and inclusion.
The letter says at one point: “Educational institutions have toxically indoctrinated students with the false premise that the United States is built upon ‘systemic and structural racism’ and advanced discriminatory policies and practices. Proponents of these discriminatory practices have attempted to further justify them—particularly during the last four years—under the banner of ‘diversity, equity, and inclusion’ (‘DEI’), smuggling racial stereotypes and explicit race-consciousness into everyday training, programming, and discipline.”
The resolution the Senate approved Tuesday says the Department of Education has misinterpreted federal law on discrimination. Further, the “dear colleague” letter “appears to signal a broader attempt to chill constitutionally protected speech … by mischaracterizing diversity, equity, and inclusion … efforts as unlawful.”
The resolution goes on to say universities have a right and responsibility to foster diversity and to denounce federal and state attacks on academic freedom and tenure and institutional autonomy.
The resolution had been introduced and debated at the April 1 Senate meeting. There was no further debate at the May 6 meeting.
The Senate also approved without further debate revisions to the class attendance policy which, among other things, elaborated on what may constitute reasonable accommodations for students who need to make up missed work and some situations in which instructors may need to comply with requests for accommodations. Among those situations are ones involving students with disabilities, experiencing the effects of sexual misconduct, serving on juries or serving in the military.
In other business, the Faculty Senate:
- Elected by acclamation officers and Executive Committee members for the coming year. The newly elected officers are president-elect Rich Leiter, College of Law; secretaryAnn Tschetter, history; executive committee members Bob Gorman of classics and religious studies, Alexei Gruverman of physics and astronomy, Elizabeth Lewis of teaching, learning & teacher education, and Max Pierobon of the School of Computing.
- Received committee reports from the Convocations Committee, the Intercollegiate Athletics Committee and the Executive Committee.
- Heard a presentation from Deborah Huryta, Americans with Disabilities Act compliance officer, and Ash Mitchell, instructional designer with the Center for Transformative Teaching, on new Title II regulations issued by the U.S. Department of Justice. The new regulations set requirements for accessibility of digital content and tools by people with disabilities. (See Attachment 3.)
