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Syracuse University finished the 2020 fiscal year in July with a $5 million deficit, Chancellor Kent Syverud said at a virtual University Senate meeting Wednesday.

The deficit accounts for just a small portion of the university’s operating budget, and managing the shortfall will be feasible, Syverud said. Spring budget reductions — which included lowering administrator salaries and implementing a hiring freeze — gave SU the room it needed to make coronavirus-related adjustments, he said.

“Unlike many of our peers, we had solid financial footing and plans to deal with this and so we are going to come out stronger from it,” Syverud said.

Despite budget challenges, SU has laid off less than 36 employees since the pandemic began, a number that has remained relatively steady since July, Syverud said.

Enrollment for the fall 2020 semester is 21,322 students, a decrease of about 1,500 since last fall, Syverud said. The university experienced record-high application numbers in fall 2019.

“While the enrollment is down slightly, I believe later this academic year we will have recovered most of that missing enrollment,” Syverud said.

Some students deferred and are planning to return to SU in an upcoming semester, he said. The university is also working with immigration authorities to enroll students facing visa or travel-related challenges, he said. Syverud expects revenue from tuition for the next year only to decrease slightly.

Syverud and Interim Provost John Liu said the decision to accelerate the fall semester seems to be proving successful in mitigating the spread of coronavirus on campus, though they cautioned students, faculty and staff against becoming complacent.

“I’ve been watching closely the situation on other campuses and the hubris that comes when people relax their vigilance,” Syverud said.

SU is hoping its newly-released calendar for the spring semester — which starts the semester a week later than usual and eliminates spring break — will limit the spread of the virus in the second half of the academic year, Syverud and Liu said.

Syverud and Liu also provided updates about ongoing diversity and inclusion initiatives on campus.

Liu expects all of SU’s schools and colleges to approve a new curriculum for the university’s first-year seminar by the end of next week. USen would be able to vote on the curriculum following the approvals, he said.

SEM 100, a mandatory diversity course for freshmen and transfer students, is currently a six-week class that does not count for academic credit. Students have said the current program is ineffective in addressing diversity and inclusion issues at SU.

The reformed SEM 100 would be a semester-long one-credit class that would pair with a separate three-credit diversity and inclusion course requirement.

#NotAgainSU, a movement led by Black students, called for the university to revise SEM 100 in a list of 19 demands it presented to Syverud in November. The chancellor signed 16 of the demands as written, including the SEM 100 provision.

A review of the Department of Public Safety by former U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch is expected to be completed by the end of this year or early 2021, Syverud said.

SU is working to provide more ways for the university community to contribute ideas about The Public Safety Citizen Review Board, a group that will hear, review and recommend actions in response to allegations of misconduct by DPS officers. Lynch and her team released a proposed framework for the board on Saturday.

“It’s important that the board be set up on more input from the community than we’ve had so far, and that’s why it’s taking longer,” Syverud said.

Published on September 23, 2020 at 11:38 pm

Contact Michael: msessa@syr.edu | @MichaelSessa3