Enrollment and budget topics of Town Hall Meetings today
Strategies for enrollment growth and other long-term, sustainable strategies for balancing the university’s budget are the topics of Town Hall Meetings today. The first was held at 6:30 a.m., a second will be at 10:30 a.m. and a third Town Hall will be at 3 p.m. The 10:30 a.m. and 3 p.m. sessions will be held in the CMU Ballroom.
The thirty day MSUM enrollment report just completed shows a Fall 2015 total headcount of 5,836 graduate and undergraduate students. This compares to 6,310 students one year ago and amounts to a 7.5 percent decline. The university’s budget for this fiscal year was built around a projected four percent decline.
“One-time carry-forward dollars from fiscal year 2015 will be used to bridge the FY 2016 budget gap,” said Jean Hollaar, Vice President for Finance and Administration. “The academic master planning process being led by Provost Bessie coupled with realistic enrollment projections will inform our longer range budget solution. In the immediate timeframe, I encourage the campus community to consider foregoing any unnecessary expenditures so we will again have a pool of carry-forward funding to help bridge next year’s projected budget gap and to allow more time for strategic implementation of the academic master plan.”
Other Town Hall speakers will include Provost Joseph Bessie on the development of an academic master plan and Director of Undergraduate Admissions Shaun Manning on enrollment growth strategies. Slides from the meetings will be posted to http://www.mnstate.edu/president/news-and-notes.aspx by the end of this week.