What’s New
Faculty members at the University of Connecticut worry that dozens of majors could face elimination as part of a review of low-enrollment programs — a process that began amid a significant budget deficit.
The Details
Christopher Vials, an English professor at UConn’s flagship campus in Storrs and president of its American Association of University Professors chapter, said 70 majors were identified as having failed to meet a threshold of 100 student completions over the last five years.
Faculty members found out about the review in May when the provost’s office asked departments with low-enrollment programs to complete an evaluation report that Vials characterized as tasking them to “justify their continued existence.”
These reports were submitted to the deans of each respective school and college, who have until November 1 to decide whether to recommend the closure or suspension of each program. They also must provide a deadline for when they’ll decide to close or continue — with adjustments — a suspended program. Their recommendations are expected to be presented before the Board of Trustees on December 11, according to Stephanie Reitz, a university spokesperson.
“It is anticipated that the end result for the review of low-completion programs will result in the closure of some programs,” Anne D’alleva, the provost, and Gladis Kersaint, the vice provost for academic affairs, wrote in a memo to all academic deans.
Majors like philosophy, women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, and animal science are on the chopping block. With the exception of Spanish, every program within the university’s literatures, cultures, and languages department is under review. The department, which houses nine majors, is seemingly divided on its next step, as it postponed a vote on Wednesday on whether it should move forward with the provost’s review or preemptively merge its majors into one or two programs, Vials said.
Vials said that while the programs under review have a smaller number of majors, they host popular classes that are full every semester and play a key role in recruiting faculty.
Reitz said the university is not directing that any programs or majors be eliminated: “Rather, it is asking deans and department heads in the schools and colleges for their ideas on how to address the challenge of low-enrollment programs.”
If the university were to sunset a program, Reitz wrote, the decision would be in collaboration with deans, department leadership, and faculty, and no cuts would be made “solely based on budget considerations.”
The Backdrop
Last fall, UConn unveiled a plan to reduce the operating budget of all of its units — colleges, schools, administration, and institutional support — by 15 percent over the next five years to combat what was then a $70-million budget deficit.
A one-time infusion of state funding has eased the pain for this year, but the university’s expected funding gap for the 2026 fiscal year is about $72.8 million, according to Reitz.
State support for public colleges in Connecticut has dropped in recent years, but federal Covid-19 relief funding helped to fill in the gap. That funding source is expected to dry up by fiscal year 2026, however. Vials said he believes the university is trying to make a point to the state legislature that its recent austerity measures have impacts.
“The provost office is basically trying to show the legislature that they can draw blood — that they’re serious as they ask for more money,” Vials said.
UConn’s situation mirrors what happened last year at West Virginia University, another flagship that made sweeping academic-program cuts in response to a ballooning budget deficit.
West Virginia shuttered 28 academic programs and eliminated 143 faculty positions, including its department of world languages, literatures, and linguistics, partially citing low enrollment.
Reitz, the UConn spokesperson, alluded to broader challenges with foreign-language program enrollment. “We value the LCL department and believe language study is essential to our strong identity as a global university,” Reitz said. “However, we also know that students are turning away from language study all around the country, and low enrollment in those areas is an issue beyond UConn.”
The Stakes
While a host of public regional universities have taken heavy hits to their academic offerings, what’s happening at UConn reflects that these financial struggles are not exclusive to smaller, less-resourced institutions.
“I am worried that by killing all these programs and limiting offerings for both students and faculty, they are very much compromising our status as a research university and as a serious university,” Vials said.