By Jeffrey Addair-
Delays to the planned furloughing of 15,000 employees due to the pandemic, will cost the university Of Arizona $4m, it has been revealed.
The University of Arizona President Robert C. Robbins(pictured) said Covid-19 could not be hoped away delay will provide the university time to “have meaningful and transparent discussions regarding the trade-offs we must consider for all faculty and staff who will be impacted,” he added.
“We cannot hope away COVID-19 and its financially devastating effects,” Robbins said. “We need to protect all of our colleagues as much as possible by sharing this burden now.
President Robert C. Robbins announced a second extension of the university’s furlough plan hours before the furloughs were supposed to take effect on Wednesday. The program is now scheduled to begin on Aug. 10.
“You may not always agree with a decision — especially ones that impact you, which I respect — but please understand that it comes from a place of deep concern for you and a strong sense of my responsibility for all people at the University of Arizona,” Robbins said in the email.
The change came after the university’s General Assembly, which comprises about 42% of all faculty, voted late last week to officially recommend delaying the start of the program to Sept. 7 .
A subsequent letter from the Committee of Eleven, a group of representatives of the general faculty, urging Robbins to consider their recommendation. Robbins first announced the university’s plan to furlough employees as an effort to mitigate COVID-19-related financial loss in an email April 17. It was originally slated to start on May 11 and last through June 30, 2021.
In response to initial concerns from faculty and staff about “the program’s flexibility, complexity, and immediacy,” Robbins updated and delayed the plan to take effect on July 1.
Eliminating the furlough and furlough-based salary programs now slated for August is not an option, though. The university cannot recover additional losses should the program not move forward, Robbins said in the letter.
Robbins said the university needs to prepare for “ongoing adjustments to university operations,” which could exacerbate the university’s already “severe” financial challenges.
The University has 4,500 students and costs $12,400 for full time undergraduate residents and £36,400 for none residents. the cost of tuition has seen a rise due to the decrease in government support and large increase in administrative staff over teaching staff.
Undergraduate students who enrolled in the UA’s optional tuition guarantee program in 2014 will remain at $11,591 for residents and $30,745 for non-residents through the 2018–19 academic year.
The University of Arizona was ranked 52 by the Center for World University Rankings in 2017 and 34 in the U.S. The 2018 Times Higher Education World University Rankings rated University of Arizona 161st in the world[24] and the 2017/18 QS World University Rankings ranked it 230
The University of Arizona is a selective University a “selective” university often admitting a number of National Merit Scholars.
The United States National Merit Scholarship Program is a U.S academic scholarship competition for recognition and university scholarships administered by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC)- a privately funded, not-for-profit organisation based in Evanston, Illinois. The program is 55 years old.
Image:president.arizona.edu