Prioritization goals revealed

In Monday morning's faculty-staff forum and an evening student forum, the Prioritization Steering Committee (PSC) laid out recommended goals and action steps to achieve each of those goals.

The PSC gave a list of 75 steps toward achieving the goals that encompassed a wide range of actions. These included increasing contributions of programs to total revenue, discontinuing programs and majors, restructuring systems, adjusting policies, and merging programs and majors. The Prioritization Steering Committee preliminary recommendations are available online at www.emu.edu/psc.

Both forums emphasized that these goals and steps are preliminary recommendations and are by no means final. The PSC said that EMU will be working on an "evolutionary" rather than "revolutionary" approach to any final goals, meaning that the changes will be gradual as opposed to sudden.

The PSC, forum leaders, and President Swartzendruber answered questions with the information available at this point. Swartzendruber pointed out that the future cannot be predicted; if we could do so, he said, this process would be much easier.

Appeals and questions can be directed to the PSC website. Feedback is encouraged and will be received until Feb. 6. Final recommendations will be sent to President Swartzendruber on Feb. 16.

The ten goals were presented in four categories along with estimates for impact in dollars; the total estimated impact was $91,860. The four sections were "Goals to Increase Revenue," including increases in enrollment and retention, increasing the contribution of certain programs to support various costs, and increasing other sources of revenue; "Goals to Manage Costs," including achiving targeted faculty-student ratios, managing the costs of salaries and benefits, increasing efficiency and decreasing costs in administrative programs, and discontinuing selected grant programs when their funding ends; "Goals to Reallocate Resources," including providing resources for underfunded core expense in the operating budget and increasing support for selected programs; and "Other Goals" of changing structures.