UW-Madison will eliminate 90 administrative positions, 50 to 60 faculty positions and hundreds of elective courses next year while class sizes grow and fewer discussion sections are scheduled, UW-Madison Provost Peter Spear said Monday at a UW System Board of Regents listening session.
Around 30 community members advised five regents and around 50 audience members how the UW System should sustain the proposed $250 million cut in state funding during the next biennium.
Gov. Jim Doyle's budget allows the UW System to recoup $150 million in tuition hikes. UW-Madison's share of the remaining cuts is $23 million.
Ted Richards, chief executive officer of Strand Associates, argued against equal cuts across the board because the costs of educating students in technical fields, such as engineering, continues to rise.
Mike Whitcomb, a UW-Madison senior, said students are less concerned with the proposed $700 tuition hike than with staying on an extra semester if seats in required classes are eliminated.
\The bottom line for the students is they're going to be here a lot longer than they need to be here, and that's worth a lot more than $700,"" Whitcomb said.
Other speakers, like Associated Students of Madison Chair Bryan Gadow, spoke against tuition hikes.
George Nelson, executive vice president at Evening Telegram Company, said the only way to avoid perpetual budget cuts is to privatize the Madison campus, creating a research-driven university auton-
omous from state control.
""I look for some bold initiatives, and I think anything short of that and we're going to be sitting around this table at the next biennium,"" he said.
Guy Gottschalk, UW System Board of Regents president, said decreases in system funding are part of a sobering trend. The UW System employs 700 fewer faculty members than a decade ago even though enrollment has increased by 10,000 students.
""It is fair to wonder if state support will erode to where there is none left in the next 30 years,"" Gottschalk said.
Phil Certain, dean of the UW-Madison College of Letters and Science, said certain faculty positions threatens the university's national reputation and its ability to recruit top faculty members and graduate students.
""If my comments sound dire it is because there is a great deal at stake for Letters and Science and the UW System and the state of Wisconsin,"" Certain said.
This was the fifth of five listening sessions scheduled around the state.
