I got another request on tiktok to look at the University of North Carolina public university system's budget crisis situation. I haven't been able to fully process the stuff I found, but I wanted to pass along some key links/notes initially here. What you'll find are linked passages to reporting and audit documents I found.
Performance-based budgeting is the problem
Moreover, the university saw financial trouble ahead: State funding was tied to enrollment, and enrollment was dropping. Every drop of just 1 percentage point in enrollment brings a $2-million decrease in state appropriations, Gilliam said. UNC-Greensboro’s enrollment has declined by more than 12 percent since 2019.
***The BOG of the UNC system approved performance-based budgeting for the UNC universities in 2022, which was supposed to "incentivize universities to graduate more in-state students on time with less debt.
(This was supposed to benefit the universities in the face of falling enrollments but couldn't help if the enrollments fell beneath a certain threshold. It seems like the choice facing administrations are performance-based formulas or free college programs.)
*
The board’s budget and finance committee voted yesterday to cap the amount of funding UNC Asheville, UNC Greensboro and UNC Pembroke would lose due to enrollment declines of in-state students.
A preliminary analysis by UNC System officials estimated that the 16 universities would lose a net total of $20.8 million in funding due to enrollment losses, before applying the cap under consideration.
“I don't know how we would absorb [that] reduction in our budget, and I don't know how we do it in a year or two years, quite frankly,” Gilliam said.
Gilliam said UNC Greensboro has recently reduced its workforce by 5% and moved professional track faculty to 1-year contracts. He urged for more time to help universities transition, and the committee responded by passing a 4.5% cap on funding losses due to enrollment. That metric is only one factor in the overall funding model.
There's a $6 million deficit in UNC-Asheville
After many years of steady growth, 12 of the 16 universities in the UNC System saw their student populations decline this past fall. As enrollment shrinks, so will their budgets
Audit information
I found an audit document looking at UNCG's 2023 numbers. There's a whole bevy of financial institutions under the UNCG umbrella worth looking at, and some budget increases that I'm not sure what to make of given the 'crisis'.
Big federal grants increases, I imagine from COVID relief, so where's that money now? There was a $14m increase from 2021. And there's more:
Total available funds is only going up, from $247m to $292m. You can see though the big decrease in tuition dollars from 2018 from 112m to 92.2m. But why is the overall total available funds going up? Yes the tuition is going down, but what about the rest of the budget?
We did not audit the financial statements of The University of North Carolina at Greensboro Investment Fund, Inc., which represent 13.64 percent and 3.15 percent, respectively, of the assets and revenues of the University’s business-type activities, and 100 percent of the assets and revenues of the University’s fiduciary activities; The UNCG Excellence Foundation, Inc., which represent 13.56 percent and 3.04 percent, respectively, of the assets and revenues of the University’s business-type activities; nor the Capital Facilities Foundation, Inc., which represent 0.89 percent and 0.01 percent, respectively, of the assets and revenues of the University’s business-type activities.
The use agreement between the Capital Facilities Foundation (a blended Foundation) and the University provides funding for the principal and interest payments on the Renovation Advance for Theater Project and Administrative Support Project.
LINKS
https://innovation.uncg.edu/initiatives/academic-data-dashboards-admin-services-review/
https://innovation.uncg.edu/updates/a-message-from-the-chancellor-4/
https://www.wunc.org/education/2023-02-13/unc-greensboro-budget-cuts-carolina-education-colleges
https://www.uncg.edu/campus-weekly/2023-24-budget-reductions-and-our-path-forward/
https://emma.msrb.org/IssueView/Details/FA5EDB199C7F10250686567E24043A32
https://emma.msrb.org/P11726595-P11327136-P11760880.pdf