Chancellor Dan Greenstein appeared before a joint Senate Appropriation and Education committee hearing yesterday for a quarterly review of the State System of Higher Education Redesign, and said “Things seem to be moving as planned.”
Greenstein nevertheless faced some tough questions, and had another interesting conversation with Senator Joe Pittman, who asked for a breakdown of how the extra money the legislature allocated for the Redesign is being spent. The state authorized $50 million for the plan and the System found another $25 million by retiring some debt.
Greenstein said about $15 million is being used to “transition to sustainable operation,” and about half of that is being used to address “cross subsidies,” where more successful universities help less successful ones financially.
Pittman was particularly concerned that more stable schools such as IUP are endangering their own sustainability by continuing to prop up failing schools.
Greenstein acknowledged the “courageous work” being done at IUP, but then said that while IUP’s sacrifice is tough, so is the process of consolidating six universities into two.
Greenstein also told the committees that the State System is in the midst of another early retirement incentive offering to faculty and staff employees, and will know by November 15th how successful that was.
Greenstein will appear today before the House Appropriations and Education committees.
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