March 21, 2024

Email communication from President Sarah Bolton to Whitman faculty and staff:

Dear Colleagues,

As we shared in conversations in January and further in the post-board meeting presentations on March 7th and 8th, the College is working to address upcoming financial challenges, many of which are common across higher education. As we work to address these challenges, transparency and collaboration will be very important, and so I will communicate regularly with you. This note is a follow-up to the March 7th/8th discussions, summarizing the information shared there for those who may not have been able to attend or who would like to review it further.

Whitman is a strong institution in a great many ways, including our excellent academic and co-curricular programs, our dedicated faculty and staff, and our strong endowment, which comes largely from alumni gifts, and sustains forty percent of operating costs each year.

Like many colleges and universities, Whitman College also faces challenges, most of which originate from the decreasing numbers of students going to college in the United States. As a result, many colleges have falling enrollments, and most find themselves competing for students, who are seeking strong programs as well as lower costs. Families, even those with large financial resources, are making decisions based at least in part on scholarship offers. And, colleges competing for students are responding with increasing scholarship offers for students—both for those who have financial need and those who do not. As a result, the funds coming to most colleges from students and families have decreased, and are expected to continue to be under pressure for the coming decade. These challenges do not have simple solutions.

As we shared in open meetings for staff and faculty, we currently anticipate that the college’s total resources for operations will be about the same in 2026 and 2027 as they are this year. But, because we need to give raises (3% raises total about $1.5 million dollars) and because other costs also increase with inflation, we predict a budget shortfall of $3-4 million in academic year 2026–2027, which would grow to $7 million in 2029 if we do not act to address it.

We will need to work together to take a comprehensive approach to address this gap and build the long-term financial strength of the College. Core components of that approach include:

• Strengthening our value proposition and distinction (continuing to evolve our programs to inspire students to choose Whitman, as described in the strategic plan)
• Growing our philanthropy (the campaign)
• Making strategic adjustments to operations - trim our budgets, likely by about 5%.

As we undertake this work, we will draw on the collective expertise of the Whitman community, balancing the budget for the coming year and also developing approaches that will serve the college and mission well for the long run. To do so, we will need to make changes that are fiscally responsible while investing in activities that strengthen the college and help us meet our mission for the future.

We wish to do this work in ways that reflect our values, including transparency, collaboration and shared governance, equity and fairness, respect for the work and humanity of individuals across the college, and evidence-based decision-making.

The first phase in this process is, of necessity, to create some budgetary flexibility with which to make decisions. Because nearly 70% of our expenditures are for salaries, wages and benefits, we will take two immediate steps related to hiring when positions become vacant.

• Pause hiring into tenure-track faculty lines. Based on the recommendation of faculty leadership, a recommendation that both the cabinet and the trustees fully support, we will not undertake tenure-track hiring until we have developed an updated, comprehensive approach to prioritizing openings. We will develop that approach this fall, when we will convene a group of faculty leaders, with Provost Mermann-Jozwiak, to develop an approach to determining which open tenure-track faculty lines will see searches and which will not.
• Hold open most vacant staff positions, and review them for urgency and alignment with our strategic priorities, as well as for possible alternative approaches, at the end of each quarter. While we anticipate filling most vacant positions, we expect to eliminate several vacant staff positions in each quarterly review cycle.

In the fall, the Cabinet will work collaboratively with the President’s Budget Advisory Committee, faculty leadership, and colleagues across campus to make the longer-term plans and decisions to balance our budgets. In addition to studying which faculty and staff openings to fill, we will also look at ways to reduce other expenses at the College, including utilities and purchases, as well as thinking about ways to grow our resources.

While the details of these plans will come in time, I want to be clear that we do not intend to solve our challenges by asking everyone to do more and become overstretched. That is neither wise nor fair. Where we end up needing to reduce staffing, we will also be careful to reduce work by finding things that we can stop doing.

Budget challenges are hard, and some of the decisions we make will be hard as well. However, I am completely convinced that, working together, we can find the right ways to move forward, and to strengthen our college for the future.

We have posted the slides from the March 7–8th open meetings for staff and faculty here, in case you may wish to see them. We invite you to share questions or thoughts here, and will continue to answer those as transparently as possible as we move forward.

Sincerely,

Sarah Bolton