an article<\/a> in The Chronicle of Higher Education, \u201cAbout two-thirds of all degree-granting public and private nonprofit colleges exhibited one of the three key indicators of financial stress: consistently losing money, fewer students enrolled than a decade ago or a decline in state appropriations or endowment values.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\nThe article also stated that universities have recently been more willing to discuss financial hardships, which leads to the universities\u2019 leaders putting less emphasis on revenue generation, and more on cutting costs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In Provost Coll\u2019s email, he stated that currently, Western has not made any decisions regarding the closure of any academic programs. In the scenario where a program does get cut, students who are in that program can finish their degree uninterrupted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are many people and committees dedicated to finding a solution to Western\u2019s finances, including the University Budget Advisory Committee and the newly reinstated Academic Sustainability Committee. In an email Feb. 23, President Jesse Peters outlined the steps the university is taking. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe new (vice president for administration and finance), Kwabena Boakye, begins March 1st, and he will take over coordination of our budget reduction strategies, including processes for gathering information and feedback,\u201d said President Peters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The university may have to make some difficult decisions, however, the designated committees, Vice President for Administration and Finance Boakye, Budget Director Camarie Moreno and Western\u2019s other leaders are working together to ensure that students can still thrive at Western.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI know this type of announcement is stressful and worrisome,\u201d said President Peters. \u201cBut our proactive steps will set us on a path for sustainability. Now is the time for us to consider how we best implement innovations and efficiencies so that the university can continue to serve students and fulfill our mission.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Contact the author at howlnews@mail.wou.edu<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
March 12, 2025 Written by: Sadie Latimer | News Editor Recently, Western\u2019s leaders have been growing concerned with the state of the university\u2019s finances due to increasing operational costs and lower enrollment. March 5, in an email sent to Western students, Provost Jose Coll said, \u201cUnless we take additional measures to reduce expenses for the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[5021,6594,1237,6596,6599,6604,6595,6603,6600,6593,1767,6601,6598,507,623,5140,6602,1502,6592,6597,6591,684],"class_list":["post-22522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-academic-programs","tag-academic-sustainability-committee","tag-budget","tag-budget-director","tag-camarie-moreno","tag-closures","tag-cutting-costs","tag-enrollment","tag-expenses","tag-financial-stress","tag-jesse-peters","tag-jose-coll","tag-kwabena-boakye","tag-oregon","tag-president","tag-provost","tag-revenue-generation","tag-sustainability","tag-the-chronicle-of-higher-education","tag-university-budget-advisory-committee","tag-vpfa","tag-western"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22522"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22522\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22525,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22522\/revisions\/22525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wou.edu\/westernhowl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}