QuickTake:

The university has not yet revealed the scope of its budget woes, but the president outlined three main factors that will contribute to a budget decrease for the 2025–26 school year.

This story will be updated.

University of Oregon President Karl Scholz emailed faculty and staff Tuesday with a grim preview of the school’s budget for the coming academic year.

The email outlined three main reasons for the school’s financial challenges: The loss of federal research funding, state funds that fall short of the institution’s needs and the decline in out-of-state students enrolling at UO. These factors combined to create “a level of financial difficulty the university has not experienced in many years,” Scholz wrote.

For the 2024–25 school year, out-of-state students are paying $44,598 for tuition; in-state students pay $16,137. (These figures do not reflect any financial aid students might get.) In the fall of 2024, roughly 48 percent of UO students were from out of state.

Scholz did not say how much money the university will have to cut from the budget and where the money will come from, but he said the university will have to make “difficult decisions” in the near future.

“We will work over the next several months to bring intentionality and a principled approach to a difficult task,” Scholz said. “That work will engage leaders across the university, allowing for local knowledge to inform our final decisions.”

The university will provide more information late next week, according to Scholz, and there will be a town hall meeting to answer questions and share concerns before the end of the term. The town hall meeting has yet to be scheduled.

Lilly is a graduate of Indiana University and has worked as a journalist at the Indianapolis Star and in Burlington, Vermont, as well as working as a foreign language teacher in France. She covers education and children's issues for Lookout Eugene-Springfield.