Key takeaways from last week's Town Hall

Office of the Chancellor

Dear Colleagues,

Last week, I led a Town Hall for all UWM employees. I invite you to watch it yourself to learn all that was discussed. I was joined by Provost and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs Andrew Daire, who addressed enrollment trends and resulting budget implications, and Senior Vice Chancellor for Finance and Administrative Affairs Robin Van Harpen, who spoke about budget planning. Here are some of the key points we covered. 

Federal and state government updates

We will continue to monitor the federal actions, court orders and events as they unfold and respond accordingly with guidance from the Universities of Wisconsin.  

In the meantime, I want to share three guiding themes:  

At the leadership level, we are all working to make sense of the information we are getting on a daily – even hourly – basis.  
We are communicating what we know through emails, the federal updates page and through meetings like the Town Hall.  
I encourage all of us to stay focused on our mission of supporting students’ journeys to graduation and beyond, creating and disseminating knowledge, and engaging in the community and world.

Free speech was brought up in the Town Hall. UWM staff may speak on matters of public interest or concern, but they must make clear that they are speaking on their own behalf and not on behalf of UWM unless expressly authorized to do so. I recently exercised my free speech rights in an opinion piece in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, emphasizing the importance of research. I invite you to read and share it.  

In state updates, Gov. Evers has proposed his $119 billion budget, which includes $856 million for the Universities of Wisconsin. The capital projects budget is separate from this, and we are hopeful that the final version will include funding for: 

UWM's Health Sciences Renovation.
Our proposed Engineering & Neuroscience Building.
Updates to Sandburg Hall restrooms.

No matter what transpires around state funding, we must take steps internally to own our future. The UWM of next year and the years beyond will be different from the past.

Budget planning

Tuition revenue is our largest funding source, and this can be uncertain. Our Fall 2024 graduate-student enrollment declined in the weeks leading up to the semester, which made a $9 million impact we could not have predicted. 

This year, although we planned a balanced budget, we are now trending into negative territory, due to loss of tuition revenue, a decline in interest income and an uptick in salary and fringe benefit expenses. We are also anticipating that we will see a softening of research revenues and indirect charges.  

Therefore, we are asking every school, college and division to voluntarily look at their own spending and pause any discretionary or nonessential spending. 

As we plan next year's budget, we are asking all units to adopt a more conservative spending stance.  

Going forward, we must be nimble. Our five-year plan, already underway, will help schools and colleges take the actions needed to be financially sustainable for the long term. Current events now add additional urgency to reach these goals.  

Enrollment trends

In good news, we enrolled our largest first-year class in a decade in Fall 2024, and we increased our market share of Wisconsin students. I congratulate the teams who have worked so hard to make this happen. 

A comprehensive enrollment strategy is being developed to guide our recruitment and retention efforts, with a specific goal of achieving a 1.5% annual enrollment increase over the next five years. Additional gains in both recruitment and retention will bolster our financial sustainability and our role as a leading contributor to Wisconsin’s workforce.

Growth actions underway

We continue to operate under the pillars of our 2030 Action Plan, which declares our commitment to students, research and community impact, positive employee experience and fiscal sustainability.  

And we are working to grow our enrollment through a variety of efforts, such as: 

Partnering with area technical colleges to guarantee a seamless transfer for all their alumni. 
Leveraging our relationships with Milwaukee Public Schools and area charter and choice schools to create stronger pipelines to UWM.
Housing the first Microsoft Artificial Intelligence Co-Innovation Lab in the nation to focus on manufacturing. 
Growing the Northwestern Mutual Data Science Institute through new degree programs and pre-college programming. 
Embracing and harnessing AI in our teaching, learning and working.

Again, I invite you to watch the Town Hall to learn more.  

In closing, thank you for all you do. I know our employees work incredibly hard to make UWM the leading university it is, and I am deeply grateful for your dedication and your enduring Panther spirit.