 |
Dear Members of the Smith Community,
Following intensive deliberations and consultation,
including a recent day-long retreat with the faculty, staff, and student members
of the Committee on Mission and Priorities (CMP) and the Advisory Committee on Resource
Allocation (ACRA), as well as several members of the board of trustees, I am writing
to share with you a proposed budget reduction plan for the college that would achieve
$30 million in permanent reductions by June 30, 2011. The plan reflects months of
serious deliberation on that which is integral to the Smith experience and that which,
in a changing higher education landscape, can be envisioned or delivered in new ways.
I am particularly proud that this proposed plan maintains
our foundational commitment to meeting students’ full demonstrated financial
need, ensuring that high-achieving students from all backgrounds will continue to
have the benefit of a Smith education.
This plan reflects not only the hard work of CMP and
ACRA but thoughtful comments and suggestions from hundreds of you, including alumnae
and parents, who brought forward important ideas about ways we can make our operations
more efficient and sustainable, use our facilities and resources more wisely, recognize
employee contributions, and protect important foundational commitments to financial
aid, diversity and equity. I thank you for the creative thinking and generosity of
spirit you have brought to our in-person and online forums over the course of this
challenging year.
As you study the proposed plan, you will encounter initiatives
with which you readily agree and others that might feel less comfortable, particularly
those involving the reduction or elimination of positions. It is never easy to reduce
positions in the context of a close-knit community; the recommendations to do so
are always made with reluctance. We estimate that approximately 55-60 positions would
be affected in this proposed plan, either through layoffs, reductions in work schedule
or leaving a vacancy unfilled. We expect specific reductions to be determined and
communicated to affected employees no later than June 30, as we develop a plan to
sequence and implement the budget changes across all areas. Employees whose positions
are eliminated will be offered a generous severance package, outplacement services
and career counseling. In addition, for one year after the notice date, they will
have the status of internal applicants for any vacant positions that we decide to
fill.
In the coming weeks before the May 2 meeting of the
board of trustees, I would like to hear your reactions to the elements of the proposed
budget reduction plan. Please use the community feedback
site to share your thoughts in ways that others may read and learn from them.
In addition, the proposed plan will be the main topic at a staff forum at
2 p.m. Wednesday, April 15, in Sage Hall; a student forum at 4:30 p.m. Wednesday,
April 15, in Weinstein Auditorium; and the April 22 faculty meeting.
Even as we focus on the specifics of significant cost
reductions, it is vitally important for us to take a long view of the future of Smith,
an institution that has responded with remarkable resilience, throughout its history,
to difficult times. We recently admitted the class of 2013, from the largest pool
of applications in Smith’s history. We are moving forward, with the full support
of our board, in planning to launch a fundraising campaign this year. As we welcome
hundreds of admitted students to campus over the next few weeks before the May 1
decision deadline, it will be important to remind ourselves to see Smith through
their eyes, as an institution that has continued to invest in its faculty and staff,
its academic resources, and its facilities -- including Ford Hall, whose opening
we will celebrate next fall -- all in service of providing an extraordinary and transformative
education.
This plan, while comprehensive, is not the end of a
conversation but a beginning. It is a starting point from which to build an even
stronger future for an already vital and competitive institution. It is a plan designed
to give the college the financial agility to respond to short-term contingencies
while, at the same time, securing a position of excellence and distinction well into
the coming decades. As Board of Trustees Chair Cornelia Mendenhall Small noted, in
the context of a serious recession whose duration cannot be predicted, “Smith
needs to be on the crest of the wave, not under the water.”
In closing, I want to commend the work of CMP and ACRA,
whose service this year has been one of the most challenging tasks of my time at
Smith. I am grateful for their extensive advice to me as I have developed this plan,
which has evolved considerably through their counsel. The decisions I have proposed
in this plan and the wisdom of the strategy they represent will have an effect on
the college far beyond this moment in our history.
Sincerely,
Carol T. Christ
President |
|
Message from
the President
Introduction
Employee
Compensation
Student-to-Faculty
Ratio
Comprehensive
Fee
Revenue
Facilites & Utilities
Study
Abroad
Libraries &
Information
Technology
Services
Administrative,
Student & Academic Support
Revenue
Generation
Investment
Required
Appendix
| |
