Background provided by Dr. Tim Cook on 11/3/2015 to the college

The grid with the final reductions or eliminations can be found here: Instruction Budget Recommendations
The draft proposal of reductions and eliminations can be found here: Draft Budget Proposal

After reviewing campus feedback, holding open forums, and several months of difficult discussions the final proposal of the Instructional Council’s budget reduction process is complete. These are tough decisions that impact lives and are not to be taken lightly. Please be assured that we all are committed to supporting our campus community as we work together to provide a clearer path to Clark’s future. While this work has been challenging, these decisions will guide us towards establishing more well-defined and clearer program pathways for our students.

Every member of this college understands this will not be an easy process for faculty and staff as our college moves forward. Instructional Council is working to align the appropriate information and support those faculty members directly affected. In accordance with the AHE Agreement, Instructional Council will be working closely with the Reduction in Force (RIF) committee.

Students currently in programs affected by the reductions will be able to complete the degree or certificate program they are currently enrolled in. All program elimination proposals will be submitted to IPT for consideration by November 20, 2015 with implementation dates to be determined.

Instructional Council has been tasked with developing a proposal to reduce 2 million dollars from the permanent Instruction budget. Instructional Council has already made $600,000 worth of permanent cuts by reducing sections and adjunct medical benefits. Over the last month, Instructional Council reviewed and considered hundreds of items of feedback, alternative proposals and letters of support from the community. Feedback recommended that Instructional Council estimate an overage of savings to apply towards teach out costs, RIF and cross-training costs. After careful considerations we have made the following decisions.

The subsequent transfer departments and career and technical education programs will see reductions:

All of the course offerings in the following transfer departments will be eliminated:

A proposal to eliminate the following career and technical education programs will be submitted to IPT by November 20, 2015.

 

NEXT STEPS:

I know that change can be difficult, and this type of change is often especially challenging. It is my hope that anyone impacted by these decisions will feel encouraged to access available college resources through their Instructional Leadership, Student Affairs or Human Resources. I appreciate everyone’s participation and engagement throughout this process, and I trust that our culture of mutual respect, support and collaboration will guide us forward. 

ADDITIONAL BACKGROUND:

Enrollment has been decreasing over the last few years. This steady decrease has led to college-wide budget impacts.

The following data illustrate just how much college enrollment has declined in the last 5 years:

Over the past several years, the campus has shared relatively equally in budget reductions.  This year, larger cuts were taken in areas other than Instruction to give the campus time to think thoughtfully about how to approach budget reductions.  In addition to permanent reductions, several cutbacks were taken on a one-time basis, and these funds will need to be restored.  For example, the college delayed any classroom technology and computer hardware replacements for one year.  As your efforts to create learner-centered experiences in the classroom likely indicate, the college needs to restore these funds. 

The instruction budget makes up roughly 60% of the total college budget at $38 million during 2014-15. In comparison, the next largest budget, Administrative Services, is $8.4 million, with Student Affairs following at $8.1 million. Instructional Council has been tasked with developing a proposal to reduce 2 million dollars from the permanent Instruction budget.   Instructional Council has already made $600,000 worth of permanent cuts by reducing sections and adjunct medical benefits. Over the past seven years as enrollment peaked, Instruction was one of the areas that grew the fastest.  It is time now to rebalance the budget with a clear eye toward the goal of Academic Excellence. 

Beginning in winter quarter 2015, Instructional Council developed two draft rubrics (one for transfer and one for Career and Technical Education [CTE] programs) to facilitate the process of determining potential areas of efficiencies, savings, or reductions. In spring quarter 2015, open forums were held to discuss the process and gather further feedback to add to the rubrics. Based on the feedback, Instructional Council revised the CTE rubric to include retention plan engagement data. The Transfer and CTE rubric data was shared in June 2015. Subsequent budget retreats were held during summer quarter 2015. Program and department reductions were allocated equitably across Transfer and CTE areas wherever possible to develop a proposal that identified specific programs and departments for elimination or reduction based on that data. Rubric data from the Virtual Notebook, alignment with the 2015-2020 Strategic Plan, as well as student and community needs, were all considerations in developing the budget reduction proposal. The college community was invited to provide feedback after forums in fall 2015. Several hundred separate communications were reviewed and considered by the Instructional Council.