Following the announcement of the University of Maine System’s $36 million budget shortfall for fiscal year 2015, there has been much speculation and fear. The prospect of cutting even more faculty positions as well as entire programs from the curriculum is something that no one wants, but in the eyes of the board of trustees, these are necessary measures that must be taken to fix the deficit.

The University of Southern Maine was the first to feel the sting of these budget cuts, with USM president Theo Kalikow announcing four full academic programs and between 20 and 30 faculty positions would be cut in an effort to chip away at the $14 million shortfall that USM must resolve.

In response to this announcement, around 125 students and faculty stood in protest on Monday, March 24 to show their displeasure. The group walked out of their classes midday and gathered outside of the University of Maine School of Law building on USM’s Portland campus, where the administrative offices are located. This resulted in the building being closed early.

Many of the protesters believe that the crisis is manufactured, and that the UMS has a large reserve of money saved that it isn’t willing to draw from. However, Kalikow insists that the crisis is real, citing the continuing freeze of state funding, tuition rates, dropping enrollment and an aging infrastructure on some campuses as primary reasons for the situation. Kalikow has also emphasized that this is a system wide problem, with all seven UMS campuses having to make sacrifices.

Jules Purnell is a USM student studying women and gender studies and feels that students should be more involved with decisions of this magnitude.

“We feel like we’re getting a lot of double-talk,” she said at the rally. “We need them to realize we need these faculty members and programs, otherwise our campus will be gutted and we won’t have any way of reaching the vision we’ve set forth for our university.”

Solidarity

After having witnessed the happenings in Portland, students on the Orono campus have started taking notice, with the announcement last week that UMaine would be signing with health insurance company Cigna, replacing its employee assistance program and student housing policy changes being the first of a raft of cuts and changes made to the campus structure.

On Tuesday, a small group of concerned students met in the Wade Center in the Memorial Union to discuss the problems facing the UMS and possible steps that could be taken. Leading members of various activist groups on campus were present, including members of the Maine Peace Action Committee and Samantha Perez, president of The Green Team. The group gathered with the intent to show solidarity with USM and support the cause of the students who are at odds with UMS administration about how things are being handled.

Perez, who led The Green Team in a meeting with the UMS board of trustees regarding divestment from fossil fuels last month, set up a Skype chat with Meaghan Lasala, a USM student who also participated in the protest on Monday. Lasala recounted the day when protesters attempted to occupy the Provost office in Portland.

“We feel that [the administration] stepped over students bodies rather than communicating with us,” Lasala said.

“They’re an inspiring group of kids down there,” Perez said of the protesters at USM. “I wasn’t going to get involved until it was announced that there would be cuts here.”

Perez mirrors Lasala’s thoughts regarding the way things are being handled by upper level administration.

“I think students are starting to get motivated. We need to start being included in decisions made at the university. That’s my main goal,” Perez said. “I don’t think we’re considered as main constituents.”

Perez hopes that by working together with students from other schools, a solution can be found that would nullify the need to cut programs and faculty.

“I think that all the departments are really important. We’ve been working so hard [for department collaborations]. Everything here is important or it wouldn’t be here. I can’t think of a single faculty member I’d like to see let go,” Perez said.

“We’re still at the research stage; we’re going to dive deep and get some options,” Perez said. “Hopefully the budget cuts won’t need to happen and the University of Maine System can have a brighter future.”

Legislative action

With the sponsorship of Representative Ben Chimpan of Portland, USM students drafted an emergency bill that was brought before the Maine Legislature on Thursday. The bill, if passed, would institute a one-year moratorium on layoffs and budget cuts by the UMS in the hopes that another solution could be found in the meantime. It also called for the creation of a stakeholders group of students and faculty that would study the system’s finances and make recommendations over the course of the moratorium.

However, because of the last minute proposal, the bill went before a 10-member group of legislative leaders who voted 6-4 to reject the bill, with those who opposed the bill arguing that passing the bill would be overstepping the bounds of their legal power.

“There’s a crisis right now in our public university system,” Chipman said at the council meeting. “Students and faculty are asking for our help, and I propose that we address this crisis now.”

Despite this setback, the student solidarity group, now called #UMaineFuture, is determined to continue its fight.

“If they don’t want to make it a legislative issue, then we’ll make it an election issue.” Shannon Brennan, a UMaine Orono student who is also an organizer for #UMaineFuture, said in a prepared statement after the decision.

Orono cuts announced

The University of Maine Orono’s original budget shortfall was estimated to be $12 million. After further analysis which included imminent retirements, this number has been lowered to $9.7, still a steep climb. On Friday, the university finally announced the cuts that it would be making in order to make up for this deficit.

Although no programs will be cut, 61 positions will be eliminated, 30 of which will be through retirements while the other 31 will be non-faculty positions with five of them being layoffs. $5.3 million will also be syphoned from a savings fund that has been built up over the course of the last decade. According to Vice President for Administration and Finance Janet Waldron, this will nearly deplete the savings fund, restricting the university’s ability to react in case of further financial emergencies.