University of Utah President Taylor Randall said he thinks “there’s reason for optimism” in this year’s legislative session as lawmakers call on universities to shift funds towards courses with better job outcomes.
“We’re having good conversations with the legislature, and we found that there is common ground on the notion that they want students in the state of Utah to be extremely well prepared for their futures,” he said last Thursday in an interview with The Daily Utah Chronicle. “That gives us plenty of room to talk about how we do it.”
In October, House Speaker Mike Schultz told Utah’s public colleges to prepare for 10% budget cuts. Days before the speaker’s announcement, Randall and two other U administrators emailed deans and department heads to tell them to run “budget reduction exercises” in preparation for the cuts, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
Now, the U is at a point where there won’t be cuts across the board. Rather, there will be a reallocation of funds, Randall said.
“We have to look at programs with redundancies and administrative costs, and we need to be able to reallocate dollars into programs with what they’re calling ‘high workforce potential,'” he said.
While the U is preparing for a budget reallocation, Rep. Karen M. Peterson introduced the Higher Education Strategic Reinvestment bill, or H.B. 265, on Jan. 17.
The bill would require universities to use enrollment levels, graduation rates, employment outcomes and workforce demands to determine which academic programs and divisions are “operationally efficient.” Schools would then have to either reduce or eliminate inefficient programs and shift their funds to divisions deemed more efficient.
Other legislative priorities for higher education include increasing staff and faculty pay and expanding the U’s medical school class, with a regional medical campus opening in St. George in 2027 with 25 students, Randall said.
Physical Development Plan
Randall also discussed how the U is working on the finishing touches of its Physical Development Plan.
To accommodate its goal of 40,000 students by 2030, the U is drafting a new 10-year site plan. It aims to address some of the students’ chief concerns, like building new parking lots.
“The one strategy that is certainly being explored is that we densify the center of campus and park on the periphery,” Randall said.
U spokesperson Rebecca Walsh added there are plans to install smart systems to identify available parking spots.
“It won’t be like Disneyland, where you’ve got the electronic signs above all the spots, but there will be cameras that can identify where there are open spots,” she said.
Randall said a draft of the development plan will be released in March after the Board of Trustees reviews it.
