Forsee speaks to faculty concerns

Other concerns included Missouri's educational competitiveness.

By Greg Young

Published Feb. 23, 2009

In a town hall style meeting Friday morning, UM system President Gary Forsee outlined budget concerns the university is facing because of the recession.

The town hall meeting, which was attended by about 200 MU faculty and staff, was one of six stops on three campuses Forsee made last week to try and explain the budgetary concerns MU is facing due to the recession. Forsee spoke for about 30 minutes, and then took questions from faculty.

Of particular concern to those attending were the potential furloughs that might be instituted if the budget outlook worsens. Forsee said furloughs were highly unlikely. The chance furloughs will be needed is less than when Forsee originally presented his plan to the UM system Board of Curators.

Additionally, Forsee said the MU campus is in a strong position to avoid furloughs.

"Unless the state has a withhold that can't be dealt with other issues, we aren't going to deploy that," Forsee said.

Other employees, including senior lab mechanic Richard Wilman, were still concerned about the proposed furloughs. Wilman said he knows a lot of staff members who are worried about the economic climate.

"I think people are just scared about it," Wilman said.

Forsee, in his opening remarks, outlined specifically the budgetary concerns the UM system is facing. MU receives funding from four primary sources: tuition, philanthropy, external research and state funding, which has been unpredictable, Forsee said.

In 1998, MU received as much as 60 percent of its funding by the state, a number that has been reduced to as low as 27 percent.

Forsee also addressed the economic stimulus package, which was signed into law last week. Although optimistic about the overall package, Forsee was reluctant to admit whether the UM system would directly be impacted by its passage.

"We don't know how all of these fiscal pieces will fit together," Forsee said.

Afterward, master pipefitter Kenny Bassett, who would be affected by the furloughs, said the administration was well attuned to the concerns of its employees.

"I am sincere in my belief that the upper administration is concerned about its employees and all its staff and faculties," Bassett said.

Forsee also outlined some of the other, long term concerns the UM system will face, the pipeline of students coming from Missouri and teacher salaries, which in many instances are not competitive with other universities nation-wide.

Forsee cited statistics that show Missouri in the bottom quartile of states, with only a 7 percent increase in children who want higher education.

Additionally, there have been reports, such as The National Center for Higher Education Management Systems report that shows only 13 states rank below Missouri in terms of percentages of high school students who go directly to college.

"We are not where we need to be," Forsee said. "We've got to make sure we are vigilant in the future."

In the end, even though Forsee said recession was a "100-year economic period" he was confident that MU will meet the economic challenges.

"Our strength as a university needs to be to rise to the situation," Forsee said.