FAS Refines Budget Cuts

In order to cope with the long-term challenges posed by a budgetary shortfall of at least $100 million, departments and centers of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences are working to refine proposed budget cuts—a process concurrent with more over-arching cost-reduction measures being spearheaded by the administration.

In an interview last month, FAS Dean Michael D. Smith said departments have submitted proposals detailing areas that could sustain cuts. The “vast majority” of departments have founds ways to trim 15 percent of their budgets in keeping with a recommendation Smith made in December, the Dean said.

“Part of the issue here is we can’t stop the business of the whole education process as we’re moving forward,” Smith said, emphasizing the importance of supporting current operations while planning for the future through the more general “80% FAS-wide plan” announced in January.

The plan—which will aim to close the projected $100 to $130 million budgetary shortfall—is an early attempt to begin turning localized feedback from individual units within FAS into a more generalized scheme for cutbacks.

“It’s a much more macro thing, as opposed to what’s happening today,” Smith said. “It needs to be guided by what we’re trying to do over the longer term.”

Smith wrote in a letter to FAS faculty and staff that he was working with fellow deans to develop the plan by the end of January, but administrators have yet to release more information on the plan, and department leaders interviewed by The Crimson in the past week expressed confusion regarding its specifics.

Meanwhile, departments have been coordinating with divisional deans to hone in on areas that can be cut, according to Statistics department administrator Betsey B. Cogswell.

She said the department is currently waiting for confirmation of a proposal for a 15 percent reduction in the budget.

Though Smith’s 15 percent benchmark for cuts came in a December faculty meeting, the FAS Dean has acknowledged that in the final budgetary plan, some departments may have to trim more or less than that figure.

“I think the administration is trying to get a handle on what happens in individual departments, and what one department needs is not necessarily what another department needs,” Cogswell said, foreseeing a disparity of as much as 10 percent between departments. “We’re all so different.”

Some surmise that the science divisions may see the largest budget reductions.

“It’s the natural sciences which are going to be critical in this process because that’s where the big money is,” said Richard Tuck, chair of the social studies committee.

Robert E. Holt, a laboratory administrator in the Chemistry department, said that he has been told that FAS funding of the department may decrease by over 20 percent.

Finding places to trim poses a unique challenge to smaller departments, in which staff salaries take up a large proportion of budgeted funds.

Staff salaries are not under the purview of departments, according to Daniel G. Donoghue, the English department’s director of undergraduate studies. This means that reducing overall spending requires slashing chunks of already small departmental operational costs.

“The 15 percent is actually a much larger figure for some programs because budgets often include staff salaries, which can’t be cut,” said Maria Tatar, who chairs the folklore and mythology committee. “The real percentage could be closer to upwards of 30 percent.”

Department chairs have said that they view cutting salaries as the least desirable option on the table, since staff salaries are already low.

—Staff writer Bonnie J. Kavoussi can be reached at kavoussi@fas.harvard.edu. —Staff writer Esther I. Yi can be reached at estheryi@fas.harvard.edu.