ESU Withdraws Letter of Intent to Retrench With New Focus on Academic Program Alignment

Posted by: admin on October 2, 2014, No Comments

ESU President Marcia G. Welsh, Ph.D., announced earlier today that administrative officials at East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania have withdrawn a letter of intent to retrench that was originally sent to local faculty union representatives on July 30, 2014.

According to Welsh, there were a number of contributing factors that resulted in the decision to withdraw the letter, which had outlined retrenchment consideration for the 2014-2015 academic year. Most specific factors included an increase in enrollment, success with academic program changes implemented last year that enabled ESU to work on course redesign and program realignment in several academic and non-academic areas, and effective cost management.

“We were pleased to report the University’s first enrollment increase in four years this fall, combined with changes in academic programs implemented last year, have made a significant impact on this year’s financial picture,” said President Welsh. “The outlook for ESU’s 2014-2015 budget appears to be much brighter based on this enrollment growth, coupled with other revenue enhancements received by the university. Together, these changes resulted in an additional $1 million in revenue for ESU to help us with the structural problems that continue to need work.”

In light of these positive changes, however, she noted that ESU will move forward with the decision to place the music program in moratorium and will follow the provisions of the faculty collective bargaining agreement. This decision was made as a part of last year’s plan.

“For the current year, we need to work closely with faculty to continue to examine and evaluate all of our academic programs to ensure they are strong, current and best serve student interest and Commonwealth need,” said Welsh. “Although the budget is obviously a concern, equally important is the quality of our academic programs. We currently have fifteen searches underway for tenure-track faculty positions in programs that have demonstrated growth and that have demonstrated their ability to serve our students’ interests and Commonwealth need. Moving forward, we must maintain our focus on programs that ensure we have created a stronger future for our institution.”

According to Ken Long, vice president of administration and finance at ESU. “We remain fiscally challenged and need to continue to look for ways to tackle expenditures increasing more than three times the rate of revenue, largely due to escalating personnel cost and investment in our aging buildings and technology infrastructure.”

Beyond the revenue increases, Long attributes budget success in the current year to academic and administrative program changes, reductions in international student waivers, consolidation of services, and realignment of philanthropic activities with the ESU Foundation.

“ESU is an institution of great opportunity,” said Long. “We need to continue to capitalize on our strengths and provide our students and the region with experiences that are both worthwhile and rewarding. Through President Welsh’s leadership and the support of the ESU Community, that’s exactly where we’re headed.”