After Reprieve, Sudden Cuts - Ry Rivard, Inside Higher Ed

The University of Southern Maine is planning to eliminate between a fifth and a sixth of its faculty, and roughly a seventh of its staff, and to embark on a vast restructuring of its academic departments. Faculty and students are expressing deep concern the university will cut itself to the quick and perhaps beyond repair. After a year of fighting program eliminations and layoffs, faculty at Southern Maine became a national cause célèbre for opponents of sharp cuts to higher education and in particular to the erosion of liberal arts disciplines at public universities. After numerous protests, a dozen faculty jobs were spared earlier this year, but now the administration has announced far more sweeping plans to make up what it says is a $16 million budget deficit. David Flanagan, a former power company CEO who became president in August, said he needs to balance next year’s budget by eliminating 50 faculty positions and 100 staff jobs. There are about 300 full-time faculty at Maine – 280 by the faculty’s count, 320 according to the administration – and roughly 750 staff and administrators. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/10/07/new-southern-maine-cuts-announced-after-months-protest-over-old-ones