While most peer institutions have suffered budgetary losses this past year, the University Priorities Committee has recommended modest increases in some administrative departments for 2003-04, focusing on improving health services.
Yesterday afternoon, the committee presented its report on suggested budget increases for the next fiscal year to the Council of the Princeton University Community. The committee has recommend a small tuition increase to help meet the University's highest priorities for funding boosts.
Provost Amy Gutmann, chair of the committee, gave her presentation to a standing-room-only crowd of students, faculty and administrators in Dodds Auditorium yesterday. She said the group had a "particularly suspenseful session" in January, when budgetary estimates projected a small deficit in the budget.
Since then, she said, a budget upturn has allowed the committee to focus on its highest priorities for monetary increases while maintaining current levels of funding in all departments.
With a projected $350,000 surplus and just under $5 million in requests, the committee asked departments to highlight their most pressing needs, which amounted to about $1.5 million. The committee recommends making up most of the difference with a small increase in tuition and fees — about a half percent — keeping the University's total bill for tuition and fees the lowest in the Ivy League, Gutmann said.
The committee's proposal to the CPUC — one in a multi-step process of preliminary discussions before the budget is approved by the board of trustees early next year — took into account student suggestions from an open meeting earlier this year, in addition to the department requests.
Gutmann stressed that McCosh Health Center would probably receive substantial funding increases in the next fiscal year, to fund a senior staff psychologist and other high priority needs.
"I've been convinced that there's no higher priority for us to put a significant amount of services into than McCosh infirmary," she said, citing dramatic increases in patient hours for counseling and medical attention both on campus and nationwide.
According to the recommendations, the library would also receive more money for acquisitions, such as books and periodicals, and for professional development.
The report proposed more graduate school support staff and merit stipends for graduate students in the humanities and social sciences. It also recommended funding for a PeopleSoft computing update, academic managers group training, Public Safety and a new OIT staff manager for security.
In an interview last week, Joann Mitchell, vice provost and administrative secretary for the committee, said although the University did not have as many resources to allocate, "unlike some of our other peers, at least we're not in a cutting mode."
Gutmann credited the relative strength of the budget to the administration and annual giving, and Mitchell also praised the Princeton Investment Company for its success in a tough economy.
Although the unusually high attendance at yesterday's meeting was due in large part to the athletic moratorium debate, Gutmann said quite a few students attended to hear the PriCom report.
The effects of budget changes on students, she said, are "very direct, and students recognize it. [They are] very engaged, very supportive."
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