March 28, 2024

2017 – 18 Budget

The following message is from the Office of Administration and Finance. 

To Members of the UMW Community,

I am writing to give you an update on the University’s operating budget for the 2017-18 fiscal year.

The budget adopted by our Board of Visitors on May 11, 2017, addresses a number of important priorities, which are summarized below:

  1. Compensation.  The budget includes permanent salary increases of 3% for both faculty and staff effective July 10, 2017.  Faculty and staff compensation is one of our top initiatives and I am pleased that we have been able to make progress in this area both last year and in the year ahead.  However, we are not done.  For teaching faculty, we have specific market benchmarks that we want to achieve and we will continue to make progress in this area over the next few years. Similar to teaching faculty, we have undertaken a compensation study for full-time staff.  Using the findings from this study, we will craft a financing plan to address staff salary issues over a multi-year period.
  2. Financial Aid.  In 2014-15, the University adopted a financial aid leveraging strategy to stabilize enrollment in both recruitment and retention and to better manage the shape of the class for our academic profile and to support diversity.  All indications are that our strategy has put us on the right track and the 2017-18 budget includes a fourth-year installment of $1.5 million for financial aid.
  3. Strategic Enrollment Plan.  The University’s Strategic Enrollment Plan (SEP) for 2016-2020 assumes a multi-year funding strategy for meeting various undergraduate and graduate enrollment targets.  For 2017-18, the budget includes $350,000 for continued implementation of the SEP, including an allocation for a centralized scheduling system.
  4. Adult Education Programming.  UMW’s efforts in addressing the needs of the large adult population in the region, including veterans, first-generation, and other non-traditional students have diminished in recent years.  Reinvigorating this effort is critical to UMW’s mission and the economic development of the region.  The 2017 General Assembly agreed and appropriated $250,000 in additional state funding to support adult education programming in the 2017-18 budget.
  5. PC Replacement Pool.  The University has operated for a number of years without a central pool of funds to address PC replacement for faculty and staff.  Access to current and fully-functioning PCs is critical to both our teaching mission and administrative responsibilities.  The 2017-18 budget includes funding to start us on a recurring four-year PC replacement cycle.
  6. University Marketing/Web Design.  Due to budget constraints in recent years, the University has funded its marketing and web design efforts through a series of one-time budget allocations.  These critical functions need a permanent and stable funding source, which has been achieved in the 2017-18 budget.
  7. Residence Hall Renovations.  The quality of our residence halls is often a determining factor in the recruitment and retention of our students.  Although we have made some good progress in recent years, more work needs to be done.  We are considering a number of options for improving our housing stock, but regardless of the approach we take additional funding will be required.  In order to minimize the financial impact on housing rates in a single year, the 2017-18 budget establishes a residence hall renovation pool to begin to set aside funds over a multi-year period.
  8. Unavoidable Cost Increases.  The University typically must address a number of unavoidable cost increases each year and the 2017-18 budget was no exception.  Funds have been budgeted for increases in health insurance premiums (for UMW as employer), utilities, contracts, leases, debt service (for the University Center) and operation and maintenance of facilities. 
  9. Strengthening the University’s Financial Position.  Over the last decade, UMW has faced a number of budget challenges including significant state funding reductions and the loss of tuition revenue from shifts in the mix of in-state and out-of-state students.  As a result, our reserves have been utilized in order to mitigate the extent of budget cuts.  One of our priorities is to strengthen the University’s financial position and in that regard we have set aside $500,000 in the budget to begin rebuilding our reserves.  This effort will continue over several years until we have rebuilt our reserves to appropriate levels.

Funding for these initiatives in the 2017-18 budget will come from three primary sources.  First, the University will receive additional state support to partially offset the compensation and fringe benefit cost increases.  The state will fund about 40% of the cost of compensation and benefit actions with the balance coming from University sources.

Second, the 2017-18 budget includes $2.5 million in reallocations within the existing budget.  These reallocations are an important source for funding the initiatives described above.  We sincerely appreciate the sacrifices it took to make this happen.

Finally, we anticipate new revenue from Board-approved tuition and fee rate increases effective with the fall 2017 semester.  For 2017-18, UMW student costs will continue to fall right in the middle of the fifteen public universities in Virginia.

We have made significant progress in addressing our strategic priorities this year and next and will continue to do so in the future.

Thank you for your support.

Richard R. Pearce

Vice President for Administration and Finance and CFO