The newly announced cuts to Sonoma State University include an unprecedented $8 million being slashed off the instructional budget. And, nearly 9.5% of tenure track faculty members and lecturers will be laid off. That translates to almost 60 faculty and staff positions being eliminated next academic year.
It is also eliminating more than 20 major degree programs, 13 minors and four extended education programs. SSU currently offers about 45 majors, 44 minors, 14 master’s degrees and nine credential programs. Several programs are also being merged. American multicultural studies, Chicano and Latino studies, and Native American studies will be consolidated into a single ethnic studies department with one major.
The faculty reductions will impact several departments including ethnic studies, the library, modern languages, history, political science, physics and astronomy, and the Hutchins School of Liberal Studies. Four management positions are also being cut, after seven others were cut earlier this academic year.
There will also be a freeze on new faculty and staff appointments and reductions in non-essential additional pay.
The school announced it will also be eliminating all of its NCAA division two athletic programs by the end of the school year.
Interim SSU President Emily Cutrer says the cuts are necessary to address a more than $23 million budget deficit. Cutrer say the decision was prompted by declining enrollment and financial distress on the university.
