The university may have counted its chicks before they hatched when setting this year’s budget.

As a result of underestimating enrollment this year and other unforeseen changes in the budget, Syracuse University now faces a $3.2 million shortfall, leaving administrators struggling to find revisions that don’t rely on the one-time savings fund that salvaged this year’s budget.

‘Decisions will have to be made about both income and expenditures. We can’t go into the next year blindly,’ said Gerald Mager, professor of education and leadership and chairman of the University Senate’s budget and fiscal affairs committee.

This year, a $3 million tuition stabilizing fund saved the university. That money was set aside during years when enrollment exceeded expectations, emptying it will allow organizations and colleges to continue their activities unaffected this year.

‘We always try to maintain funding for things that are already established. The problem arises for new things trying to get funding,’ said Andrew Lederman, Student Association president and a member of the Senate budget and fiscal affairs committee.

Student organizations are not being cut back because they are almost all funded by the student fee, Lederman said.

Next year’s budget is quickly becoming a challenging project, as administrators try to determine where the revenue will come from.

‘There is some money left in the fund, but not very much. We wouldn’t be able to turn to that again,’ Mager said. ‘It’s conceivable that a budget would be established with a deficit that would be absorbed at some point, but we’re facing similar problems for the next five years.’

The enrollment decrease forced the university to rely on an old source of emergency money called the tuition stabilizing fund, as well as a few minor savings opportunities, to help counteract a drop in enrollment of students across the undergraduate and graduate levels, said John Hogan, director of the Office of Budget and Planning.

In particular, lowered enrollment among international graduate students and in the graduate school in general, accounted for $2.4 million of the gap, according to Senate financial records. Undergraduate decreases accounted for $800,000, and the College of Law dipped for $600,000.

The committee already has some figures to work with, though.

Last year’s five-year budget projection accounts for a 6 percent increase in tuition every year for the next five years.

‘Tuition was already planned to increase 6 percent. That’s something that happens every year,’ Hogan said. ‘We increase also financial aid. That’s part of our five-year budget plan. We’re able to cushion the blow a little bit when tuition goes up.’

While the increased tuition is expected, it does not make it any easier on students.

‘We all suffer from constantly rising tuition. We’re a tuition-driven school. Unfortunately we rely so heavily on tuition. Hopefully in the future that will change, but for now that’s the way it is,’ Lederman said.

The problem is not unique to SU, but rather is a common issue among most private schools. The university would be in worse shape if it were a public institution relying on state funding, Lederman said.

While the decreased university income may not be hurting current student programs, the reduced enrollment is. The Office of Student Centers and Programming Services, which works with SA to help organize programs for students, receives no funding from the university and is dealing with a strapped budget, said Maggie Misztal, SA comptroller and member of the Senate budget and fiscal affairs committee.

‘Enrollment decrease does indirectly affect us because it changes how much we have available,’ Misztal said. ‘The costs of the office have been skyrocketing, and the student fee isn’t rising in correlation with it, so what’s available is decreasing every semester. You can notice it. We’re being stretched as far as we can.’

The budget committee is currently reviewing this year’s budget and will soon be looking into what expenditures will have to be made next year and where things will need to be cut.

Some say that a seemingly obvious solution to fix the deficit may be to accept more students, but that may not as attractive option as it sounds.

‘It’s easy to admit more students, but it’s not so easy to admit more students and maintain the quality of students,’ Mager said.

For now, the only action that can be taken is to try and establish a balanced budget based on the standard assumption of a first-year and transfer enrollment of about 2,950, Mager said. From there, decisions will have to be made in everything from program funding to financial aid.

‘There are always minor adjustments when we face budget differences,’ Hogan said.

The budget and fiscal affairs committee must now piece together these adjustments in a way that will most benefit university.

‘A lot of intelligent people are putting their heads together to see how each action will affect the whole university,’ Mager said. ‘Be aware – we have some pretty tough decisions to make.’

Published on November 15, 2004 at 12:00 pm