‘None of us wants to do this’: UAA leaders recommend eliminating degree programs to shrink budget gap

A sign on the campus of the University of Alaska Anchorage. (Photo by Tegan Hanlon/Alaska Public Media)

Leaders at the University of Alaska Anchorage are proposing to delete, suspend or revise more than two dozen programs to reduce spending and shrink budget gaps.

UAA published the proposed program eliminations on its website on Tuesday, Feb. 25. The nine programs recommended for deletion include the university’s bachelor’s degree in theater, master’s degree in anthropology and MFA in creative writing and literary arts.

“None of us wants to do this,” UAA Chancellor Cathy Sandeen said in an interview. “But this is the situation we’re in.”

Faced with three years of budget cuts, the University of Alaska Board of Regents tasked its universities last fall, including UAA, to begin fast-tracked program reviews. The task followed a tense, months-long state budget battle.

Sandeen said it’s still early in the review process: The university will take community feedback on the proposed eliminations, and then Sandeen will send her recommendations to the regents who are expected to make the final decisions in June.

This week, UAA is holding meetings with students and employees about the initial, proposed cuts, Sandeen said.

“It is quite dramatic for a university to cut academic programs at this scale,” she said. “So it really comes as a shock and people react with anxiety and sadness because what they know as UAA is definitely changing.”

When deciding what programs should go, university leaders weighed factors including enrollment and workforce demand, Sandeen said.

“If a program is eliminated, it doesn’t mean that it was a bad program. It’s just the situation we’re in right now. Because of these dramatic, extensive budget cuts, we need to go to this extreme,” she said.

Of the more than 100 degree and certificate programs reviewed, nine were recommended for deletion, 10 for suspension, 11 for revision and about 30 for continued review.

Sandeen said UAA expects to save about $4 million by slashing programs. It’s not an immediate savings. The university needs to give faculty notice of job cuts, and it needs to provide students already enrolled in programs with a path to a degree, she said.

It wasn’t immediately clear Tuesday how many jobs would be eliminated if the proposed cuts go through.

Sandeen said just because a degree program is cut doesn’t mean every related class would also disappear.

The release Tuesday of the proposed degree program cuts follows a turbulent year for the state’s public university system.

After a lengthy budget back-and-forth, the then-chairman of the UA regents and Gov. Mike Dunleavy signed a three-year agreement in August 2019 that included a $25 million budget cut for the university system in the current academic year followed by a $25 million cut next year and a $20 million cut the following year.

UAA also continues to grapple with a significant drop in student enrollment.

Despite the cuts, Sandeen said, the Anchorage university will continue to invest in the programs it keeps.

“Many, many of our programs will be preserved and will continue and will get strong so UAA will still be here,” Sandeen said. “It’s just we will be a different UAA going forward.”

This story has been updated.

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