UO braces for more layoffs as budget cut plans take shape

This story was updated to include additional information.

Layoffs are expected to begin at the University of Oregon on Monday, Sept. 8, as schools and colleges announce how they will cut 2.5% from their 2025-26 budgets.

UO officials announced in June that the university faces a $25 million to $30 million budget deficit. To close the gap, they directed administrative departments to cut 4% and schools and colleges to cut 2.5%.

UO President Karl Scholz and Provost Christopher Long said in a release Monday that the university will release details starting the week of Sept. 7. Employees who will be “affected directly” will be notified of their job statuses starting then, according to the release. 

“While the road ahead will not be easy, the hard decisions we are taking support the mission of the university and will sustain it for generations to come,” the release reads. 

The news comes after 42 employees from the College of Arts and Sciences received layoff notices in June, with officials forecasting the potential for more at the end of the summer. 

Deans and vice presidents sent recommendations about how to implement school- and college-specific cuts to Scholz and Long this month, according to the email. Officials plan to share the university’s final plan to correct the budget deficit during the university’s next Board of Trustees meeting Sept. 15-16. 

“We are committed to meaningful consultation throughout this process and are working through established structures and leadership teams in schools, colleges, administrative portfolios and the University Senate Task Force on Budget Reductions,” the release states.

David Luebke, a professor of central European histories and the vice president for tenure-track faculty affairs for UO’s faculty union, United Academics of the University of Oregon, told Lookout Eugene-Springfield that faculty members have only the “foggiest notion” of what’s coming based on word of mouth.

“It’s a time of just tremendous stress,” Luebke said. “It’s a time of enormous outrage, frankly, at what is looming before us, bearing in mind that we don’t really know fully what’s headed our way.”

Union pushes back  

Officials say the budget deficit stems from a mix of factors — including lower out-of-state student enrollment, rising compensation and pension costs, limited state funding and uncertain federal funding — that have caused expenses to exceed revenues, forming a structural deficit.

Angela Seydel, a spokesperson for the University of Oregon, said budget-cut conversations include academic leadership and the university senate to review academic programs.

“This process will not conclude for at least another two weeks,” Seydel said in an email Wednesday. “Any reports suggesting that decisions have already been made — including any decisions to close or reduce programs — are inaccurate and premature and may be harmful to many in our community.”

She added: “Throughout this process, the university remains rooted in its values and committed to thoughtful stewardship, community engagement and building renewed momentum to meet the challenges facing higher education.”

In a release on Friday, ahead of officials’ message about the upcoming announcements, UO’s faculty union sharply criticized how officials have handled the budget cuts, alleging a lack of faculty involvement in decisions surrounding layoffs.

Some members of the union met with Long on Thursday, which is when they learned that officials will begin sending layoff notices to faculty members the week of Sept. 7. 

“We have made it clear that we would like to engage meaningfully with the Scholz administration to address possible budgetary deficits in ways that do not involve laying off faculty and staff, but have not yet been given the opportunity to do so,” the union’s email reads.

The union claims the Sept. 15-16 deadline for finalizing the university’s budget has made it “all but impossible” for officials to meaningfully solicit faculty input, as mandated by the union’s collective bargaining agreement.

Some deans have presented certain department heads with layoff decisions that had already been determined and provided “no meaningful mechanism” for feedback on those decisions, according to the union.

The union’s email also raised concerns that officials are deciding what positions to eliminate in less time than they spend choosing who to promote.

“United Academics is certain that this expedited process will have resounding negative effects on academic freedom, student experiences, recruitment of future faculty, and the reputation of UO more broadly,” the union’s Friday release reads. 

In a separate release Monday, the union pushed back on officials’ alleged citation of Article 25 of the union’s collective bargaining agreement as rationale for the upcoming layoffs. The section outlines the conditions under which officials can lay off tenure-related bargaining unit members as a result of program eliminations or reductions.

“Any and all layoffs must be the consequence of pedagogical or programmatic reforms, implemented to adapt to changes in higher education generally,” the union wrote. “Article 25 cannot and has never been used as a remedy for financial difficulties — as it is now being used to justify the fall layoffs.”

The union is also challenging the university’s claim of “structural deficit” as the reason for the budget cuts, alleging that officials only began publicly using the term during the last few months of spring term.

“United Academics strongly believe that with the largest incoming class the university has ever experienced and with the endless series of fundraising victories trumpeted by the administration, the real structural deficit is not economic but a business-as-usual attitude on the administration’s part,” the union argued.

United Academics is urging members to share how the cuts will affect their workloads through an online survey and Zoom listening sessions Tuesday and Wednesday. 

The union is also calling on faculty to rally and “strongly communicate” their views during the Board of Trustees meeting Sept. 16.