UI President Michael J. Hogan outlined his vision for the university and sounded a warning about the university’s national rankings in remarks at the meeting of the UI Board of Trustees on Sept. 23 in Urbana.
Using data from the latest U.S. News & World Report rankings, Hogan discussed possible reasons for the UI Urbana campus’s decline for the first time in 12 years. The UI dropped to 47th from 39th overall, and from ninth to 15th among public universities.
“(The Urbana campus) generally does well in these rankings,” he said in opening remarks to board members and others at the meeting.
But reputational ranking – a ranking formula that includes reputation among peers and high school counselors – as well as the categories ranking faculty resources, student preparedness, financial resources, graduation/retention rank and graduation rate indicated a decrease in performance, according to the magazine’s report.
Hogan said the rankings are not “a beauty contest,” but use quantifiable data that help keep the institution accountable.
Hogan said he believes the drop in reputational ranking is mostly a result of the state’s financial crisis coupled with the gubernatorial and admissions issues of recent years.
Hogan said strong marketing efforts would aid in the UI’s efforts to maintain a good public image. He also pointed out that high school counselors were surveyed for the first time, and the magazine concentrated on the east and west coasts for that data.
Furlough days and other university financial cutbacks would have led to a drop in both faculty salaries and resources in the financial resources rankings. Interim chancellor Bob Easter reported that 25 faculty members have left the university for better-paying jobs at other schools, receiving average salary increases of $60,000.
Hogan said the UI should be careful about over-emphasizing efforts to increase freshman class sizes. He said increasing the undergraduate population through transfer student recruitment would be a good strategy to better student preparedness, as well as retention and graduation rates.
Hogan said that when an institution cannot afford to do everything it used to, it can “find a new way.” That includes finding ways to be less dependent on state revenues, managing class sizes and increasing the number of transfer students.
STATE FISCAL CRISIS
R. Eden Martin, president of the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago and a spokesman for the Illinois is Broke campaign, reported on the state’s finances.
Martin told the board that the state’s operating budget is running a $15 billion deficit, but the real numbers, when mushrooming pension and state retiree health costs are factored in, is closer to $130 billion.
According to a Pew Center on the States report, Illinois has the worst funded pension system in the nation.
Gov. Pat Quinn’s proposed 1 percent income tax increase would do little to make a dent in the severe deficit, Martin said. A 1 percent increase would only raise $3 billion of the state’s $15 billion operating deficit.
Without budget reform and cost cutting, the tax increases needed to correct the state’s budget imbalance would be closer to 5 percent. An individual with a taxable income of $50,000 would see his tax bill jump from $1,500 to $4,000.
If the state pension systems went bankrupt, state employees could have little recourse, Martin said.
The state’s Constitution does not make the state the guarantor of pension funds, and any claims made in court would unlikely grant the pension income to retirees.
BUDGET APPROVAL
Trustees approved the fiscal year 2011 budget, which began July 1.
State appropriation to the current fiscal year’s budget is less than in FY2010, but overall budget revenue increased through tuition increases and sponsored project allocations, which include federally funded research; hospital income also rose.
The university’s total budget for fiscal year 2011, which began July 1, is nearly $4.8 billion for its three campuses, a 3.9 percent increase over FY 2010’s budget. The direct state appropriation is $700.3 million, a 6.3 percent decrease from 2010.
The University Income Fund, mostly made up of tuition dollars, increased by $102.8 million to $833.8 million, a 14.1 percent increase over FY 2010. Sponsored projects, mainly federally funded research, rose $5 million to $709 million. Hospital income at the UIC campus rose 11 percent to $50.5 million.
In fiscal year 2011, the state will contribute $723.3 million to employee health and pension benefits paid to agencies that provide services to employees.
Hogan warned that past history indicates state revenue isn’t certain.
As of Sept. 21, the state was $40.2 million behind in fiscal year 2010 funding and $205 million behind in fiscal year 2011 state funding, for a total of $245 million in arrears for university operations, he said.
Trustees also approved sending the FY 2012 operating budget request to the Illinois Board of Higher Education, the first step in the annual budget request process.
The 2012 operating budget request is a $65.2 million increase (4.2 percent) over the 2011 budget. The increase includes funding for faculty and staff pay raises. Faculty and staff have not had raises in two years. The increase also would fund facilities operation and meet inflationary cost increases.
The budget request also includes a $15.5 million allocation for Healthy Returns, the Illinois Bill of Health to support the UIC College of Medicine and other health-related educational programs.
Trustees approved the university’s 2012 capital budget request of $506.7 million, which includes $60 million for repairs and renovation. The capital budget request also includes state-financed construction projects on each of the three campuses.
OTHER BUSINESS
- Approved Harry J. Berman as interim chancellor of the Springfield campus effective Nov. 1. Berman has been UIS provost since 2005.
- Designated Richard D. Ringeisen Springfield chancellor emeritus status, effective Nov. 1. He has been chancellor at UIS since 2001.
- Approved the appointment of Robert J. Hauser, a professor of agricultural and consumer economics, as dean of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences at Urbana, effective Sept. 27 through Aug. 15, 2013. He will continue as a professor in the college.
- Extended a multiyear contract through July 1, 2011, with Ronald E. Guenther, who has served as director of the Division of Intercollegiate Athletics at Urbana since July 1, 1992. He will be paid his current annual salary of $600,000.
- Approved a multiyear contract with Howard D. Moore Jr., formerly assistant coach for men’s basketball at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, to be the head varsity coach of men’s basketball at UIC.
- Designated the landscaped area around the Urbana Carillon as the Carillon Legacy Gardens.
- Approved a policy allowing the use of certain financial transactions to support the university’s overall energy procurement program.
- Adopted the sixth edition of the “Handbook for Good Ethical Practice at the University of Illinois.”
- Approved an amendment to clarify dollar limits on purchases, leases, contracts and other actions requiring specific authorization by the UI Board of Trustees.
- Approved the Urbana-Champaign Big Broadband Fiber Optic Infrastructure Installation project with a budget of $29.4 million. The funding is from grants and an allotment from the state of $3.5 million.
- Approved an intergovernmental agreement with Champaign for the financial support of three organizations promoting economic development as well as arts programming. Champaign has agreed to distribute and monitor, on behalf of the UI, financial assistance awards in fiscal years 2011, 2012 and 2013 to these Illinois non-profit organizations: $7,000 annually to the Champaign County Convention and Visitors Bureau, $7,000 each year to 40 North/88 West, and $75,000 each year to the Champaign County Economic Development Corp.
- Unanimously voted against emeritus status for UIC education professor William Ayers.
Ayers, who retired Aug. 15 from the Chicago campus, was at one time a member of the Weather Underground, which was labeled by the FBI as a domestic terrorist group. One of his books, “Prairie Fire,” was dedicated to Sirhan Sirhan, the man who assassinated Robert F. Kennedy, the father of Christopher G. Kennedy, board chairman.
Trustees voted without comment after Kennedy spoke against the motion.
“I intend to vote against conferring the honorific title of our university to a man whose body of work includes a book dedicated in part to the man who murdered my father, Robert F. Kennedy,” Kennedy said.
“There can be no place in a democracy to celebrate political assassinations or to honor those who do so.”
