Athabasca University is considering moving it’s main campus and outsourcing the IT department as it scrambles to remain sustainable.
Those are some of the suggestions made to the university’s Task Force on Sustainability, which has been seeking out options to keep AU operational and financially sustainable.
In an email sent to staff by AU president Peter MacKinnon on Apr. 2, several of the submissions were touched on.
The email stated “many submissions call for administrative restructuring of the university to refocus more on cost recovery and operation efficiencies. Many of the options and recommendations carry weight in our present discussions.”
About 70 jobs would be lost if the IT department was outsourced.
The proposals also included a new business model where revenues and expenses would be attached to faculty members, while another stated “AU’s collective agreements are the university’s greatest challenge as routine salary increases outpace revenue.”
Both the email and comments from AU communications director John O’Brien noted that the discussions were preliminary and the points were merely suggestions.
“The fact that (MacKinnon) put out a memo is no way indicative of a decision,” said O’Brien.
AU was asked earlier this year by the provincial government to develop options for future sustainability, which led to the formation of the task force.
“We have ongoing discussions with the province and in the course of those discussions, the province has indicated … we have indicated we wanted to tackle issues of sustainability going forward,” MacKinnon explained in an interview.
“We’ve seen some difficult budgets. We want to be sure we’re doing the things we need to be doing to be sustainable.”.
AU is facing a 1.4-per-cent budget shortfall for the coming fiscal year and expects a similar cut in funding for the next school year. Other Alberta post-secondary institutions are also being hit with funding cuts.
“We’ve been cautioned that we wouldn’t expect an increase (to the budget) or that it would stay the same. We simply have to cope with it,” he said.
MacKinnon maintained that sustainability is not just a question for the task force, but a conversation for the entire university.
The task force will accept submissions until May 8 and will present their final ideas to province by June 1.
In response, the AU faculty association (AUFA) will host a meeting next Monday night at the Nancy Appleby Theatre at 7 p.m. to gather ideas from the public regarding AU’s vision and future.
“There have been financial troubles and layoffs, cuts from the government, attempts to innovate and save money. Still, rumours about Athabasca University have persisted,” said AUFA president Lawton Shaw in a press release last week.
He also criticized AU’s hiring practices and how moving the campus would do nothing but hurt the community that has long supported them.
