Facilities upkeep and increasing revenue were the two big topics discussed at President Serna’s first “Ask Me Anything” of the semester. Serna set up shop at The Edge in Markley’s Food Court from 11 a.m.-12:15 p.m. on Jan. 26. He was accompanied by Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Justin Oates and Vice President of Facilities Management, James Grigg.
Grigg said that there are plans in the works to use their $26 million facilities investment to fix deferred maintenance, namely in the residence halls, but also in main buildings like Tillman. Over the next few years they will repair heating and cooling systems, replace the roofs of Lee Whicker and Phelps, and update the bathrooms in Margaret Nance Hall.
The driving force behind these improvements is to attract new generations to the school, and bolster its appeal to prospective students.
Serna said he is “encouraged” by the turn-around in enrollment data, stating that though the past two years have each had a 10% drop, retention numbers from fall 2022 to spring 2023 went up.
“You can imagine the impact that that has on our budget, when–especially as a tuition driven institution– 40% of our revenue comes from tuition.”
He attributes this success to the Vice President of Enrollment Management, Joseph Miller.
While financial recovery is still underway, the course was reexamined last fall to determine how to minimize strain on the budget. This includes a 12 person minimum requirement for most degree programs, with only a few exceptions–like mathematics–to ensure that students are able to graduate.
Oates said that the University has used Coursedog, a platform that is focused on streamlining course availability and scheduling, for “the last few years” to help the course registrar post classes that are both in demand and resource conscious.
The president will be attending a workshop this week with other academic leadership to look at optimizing scheduling and revising the course catalog to avoid pulling back required courses. This could potentially include offering courses at different times than they have traditionally been held, or discontinuing certain electives in favor of more integral classes.
Serna also attended the House Ways and Means Committee in Columbia, SC, where he addressed this issue, among others.
“I never want us to be in a situation, or continue this situation where we’re offering classes and having to cancel them or pull them back. So we can have better data about the classes we’re offering to have a higher level of confidence that they will make enrollment then we need to do that, because I can understand from (student’s) perspective, like how frustrating it is to get your schedule built, and then have classes get canceled. That’s on us. We need to do a better job in that area.”
Campus jobs are also a part of a number of student’s daily routines, but the majority of them that are still available require that the applicant qualifies for Federal Work Study.
Federal Work Study funds are allowing individual departments to spend their money elsewhere, as budgets have been cut across the board. “I think the key was we weren’t utilizing our work study funds to the max in years prior,” Oates said, “When we were funded internally we were leaving money on the table with the government.”
The objective to utilize all of the university’s available resources is one that President Serna has reiterated across multiple interviews, and Oates said that in their presentation to the Ways and Means Committee, members were impressed with the university’s “innovative thinking.”
“President Serna realizes he’s a change agent at the university, and some of the things he’s doing to look at our program, look at how we offer–you know– our portfolio and some of those things that I think they are excited about. the President is coming in–who has experience–and doing and saying all the right things about the actions we’re taking,” Oates said.
