The Board of Regents is expected to approve the budget for the upcoming year at Thursday’s board meeting. However, the impact on student tuition is not yet known.

This year’s budget is based on tuition fees set last fall, said Warren Madden, vice president of business and finance.

“Really, [a tuition increase] is up to the Board of Regents,” said John McCarroll, director of university relations. “The earliest that would come up would be at the September board meeting.”

McCarroll said traditionally they consider the tuition increase recommendation at the September meeting, but the recommendation is not acted upon for 30 days.

“That way, they can get all of the comments and input and then set the tuition for the next academic year at the October meeting,” he said.

After all recommendations are in, the tuition will be set for the following academic year. During the 2002 fiscal year, the general university budget was reduced by $24.1 million in state appropriations and another reduction of $11.5 million for the fiscal year 2003 occurred.

McCarroll said with this budget, there will be no faculty layoffs.

“We are eliminating faculty positions, but they are open positions,” he said.

He said there will be layoffs to P and S [Professional and Scientific] and merit employees, but officials do not yet have an exact number.

“About a month ago, we anticipated about 40 layoffs,” McCarroll said. “None of these are faculty – the president said he would not lay off existing faculty.”

The total number of layoffs will be comprised of 209 full-time employees: 44 faculty positions, 80 professional and scientific employees, 58 merit employees and 27 graduate assistants. In turn, this will increase the student-to-faculty ratio.

Based on information provided by all of the colleges, McCarroll said fewer courses will be offered.

“They have been pretty successful in juggling all of the courses to meet student’s needs,” he said. “They have worked very hard to make sure courses are offered, though [students] may find fewer sections [of classes].”

“The increase in class size means faculty will have less time to spend with individual students,” Madden said. “Interactions between faculty members and students will be diminished and they can’t do as much individualized one-on-one.”

Madden said classrooms will be more crowded and it will limit the types of exams teachers can give. He said he fears all of this will reduce the ability to attract and retain faculty.

“Larger class sizes and increased teaching loads don’t make an institution more attractive,” Madden said. “We also made substantial reductions in campus improvement.”

He said salary structure, compensation arrangements, workload and activities assigned are all factors potential faculty members consider when looking into a job at Iowa State.

“On the plus side, many states are having difficulty right now, some perhaps more difficult than Iowa,” he said.

“It’s been a very challenging budget to develop and the reduced state support is a problem,” Madden said. “It will cause increased financial challenges for students, but our tuition rates are still pretty competitive.”

According to the proposed budget, the departments of animal ecology and forestry will merge, and the landscape architecture program will combine with the Department of Community and Regional Planning.

Also, the office of the vice president for external affairs will be closed, and four degree programs, including organizational learning and human resource development, community health education, engineering science and engineering applications will be eliminated.