Chico State has unveiled its multi-year plan to cut operating costs in the face of an impending budget shortfall, which is caused by state funding cuts, unfunded pay increase for faculty, and other factors.
"All of it adds up to a $32 million projected potential deficit," said Chico State President Steve Perez.
Over the next three school years, the university will take a variety of actions to cut costs. Some internal technical and Human Resources processes will be merged with the broader CSU system, and faculty are being encouraged to cancel travel for in-person, off-site conferences and professional development trainings.
The school is also making changes to its hiring practices.
"We don't have a hiring freeze, but we have strategic hiring where we're evaluating all vacancies as they appear, and determine whether we can absorb those duties with somebody else and try to help spread the workload," Perez said.
Faculty who have to take on extra work are being given bonus compensation.
The university is also reducing its number of class sections, which means larger class sizes that require fewer faculty to run. There have not been any layoffs, and Perez said none are expected at this time.
One factor helping manage the budget shortfall is student enrollment. It increased over last year, and has returned to the about same amount as the 2021-22 school year.
"Last year we grew our enrollment group for full time equivalent students … which turned around a multi year decline in enrollment," Perez said. The university recently added a new enrollment management system to facilitate this. But finding new students isn't the only important factor in increasing enrollment
"At least equally as important, maybe even more important, is to retain the students that we have," Perez said.
Student enrollment dropped dramatically in the wake of the Camp Fire and the COVID–19 pandemic, and only began to rise last school year.
