42 UO College of Arts and Sciences staff and faculty get layoff notices

The University of Oregon administration is making layoffs in its College of Arts and Sciences (CAS), due to a budget shortfall in its current fiscal year.

Chris Poulsen, dean of the college, sent an email to staff Wednesday announcing that 42 employees have received layoff notices.

The 42 employees include officers of administration, classified staff, career faculty and undergraduate student employees. The layoffs do not include graduate students or tenure-track faculty. UO spokesperson Angela Seydel said the college’s staff knew layoffs were coming months in advance, and the 2% budget shortfall is “reflective of broader financial pressures facing higher education nationally.”

The layoffs included 11 faculty members, according to a faculty union email sent to members Wednesday.

“The loss of each of our colleagues is devastating,” leaders from United Academics, UO’s faculty union, wrote in the email. “Each layoff notice reflects a decision made by upper administration, and a window into what the administration values. Each loss will have a resounding impact on our campus community.”

The university will notify faculty in other schools of layoffs over the next few weeks, according to the union email.

CAS has a $3.65 million deficit for the 2025 fiscal year, which ends June 30, and the layoffs will cut the college’s expenses by $3.5 million. Seydel said administrators have also made cuts through attrition, hiring pauses and not filling vacant positions. 

Poulsen said the college also will need to cut additional staff for the 2026 fiscal year due to the university’s $25.7 million structural deficit, and those cuts may include tenure-track faculty. Some programs may close. More news about these potential cuts will come in late summer or early fall, Poulsen said.

“The UO is facing a significant structural budget deficit in the coming year, and as the university’s largest college, CAS will need to address a proportionate share of that shortfall,” Poulsen wrote. “We are still in the planning phases, and no final decisions have been made about additional budget adjustments.”

The university is contractually obligated to give a certain number of days notice to faculty it lays off, depending on their status. Faculty who were given 90-day notices will be able to stay through the fall term, according to the union’s email. Edward Davis, chairman of the union’s organizing and membership committee, told Lookout that tenure-track faculty must be given a year’s notice before layoff.

The faculty union expressed frustration in its email to members about how the layoffs will affect staff’s ability to serve students.

“Given that we will be welcoming a record number of students in the incoming class,” the union email said, “we have serious concerns about how the loss of our colleagues will affect the working conditions of our bargaining unit faculty members going forward, and how they will be evaluated going forward if they are compelled, as President Scholz suggested, to ‘do less, better.’”