Southern Oregon University to cut 23 programs and lay off 18 employees

Listen to the article
5 min

This audio is auto-generated. Please let us know if you have feedback.

Dive Brief:

• Southern Oregon University will eliminate 10 bachelor’s degrees, 12 minors and one graduate program in the face of long-term structural budget deficits after a vote by the institution’s board.
• The public university will also lay off 18 employees and cut roughly three dozen other jobs through retirements, the elimination of vacant positions and other methods. SOU will shift 17 jobs off its payroll by funding them through alternative sources, such as the SOU Foundation, a nonprofit affiliated with the university.
• The cuts are intended to stabilize SOU following years “marked by unprecedented fiscal crises,” according to the plan approved by trustees last week in a 7-2 vote.

Dive Insight:

SOU has faced a quartet of problems plaguing other higher education institutions — declining enrollment, flat state funding, rising costs and a shifting federal policy landscape.

The university’s full-time equivalent enrollment fell almost 22% from 4,108 students in 2015 to 3,209 in 2024, according to state data. 

“It is also highly likely that the federal government’s intent to dismantle support systems for low-income students also will have a devastating impact,” the plan noted.

Earlier this year, the Trump administration sought to reduce funding to certain need-based student aid programs and eliminate others altogether, such as the Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grant program. Since then, both chambers of Congress have rejected some of those overtures in their own budget proposals for fiscal year 2026, though House lawmakers likewise pitched eliminating FSEOG. 

At the state level, Oregon’s fiscal 2025-27 budget raised funding for its public universities slightly. But SOU argued that the bump fails to cover increasing costs outside of its control, such as retirement and medical benefits.

In June, SOU’s board of trustees directed the university to find $5 million in savings by the end of fiscal 2026.

In response, University President Rick Bailey planned more significant cuts to set SOU up for longer-term stability. He declared financial exigency at the beginning of August, paving the way for a dramatic restructuring at the institution.

The plan pitched to SOU’s board Friday will cut more than $10 million from the university’s annual educational and general budget over the next four years, bringing it down to approximately $60 million total.

Academically, the proposal will sunset “low-enrolled or less regionally relevant programs” to focus on “what SOU does best for the majority of students,” it said.

Following the reduction, the university will offer a total of 30 majors and 19 minors meant to lead students toward interdisciplinary programs “aligned with regional workforce demands.”

“SOU is no longer a comprehensive university,” the plan said. “We cannot continue to provide all the programs and supports as we have in the past.”

Bachelor’s degrees slated for elimination include international studies, chemistry, Spanish and multiple mathematics programs. It will also cut a graduate leadership degree focused on outdoor expeditions.

Some programs originally considered for elimination — such as creative writing and economics — will go on with restructured curricula and face additional review in coming years. 

The plan will also restructure SOU’s honors college and eliminate direct funding for its annual creativity conference.

During Friday’s meeting, board member Debra Fee Jing Lee supported the cuts, arguing SOU‘s strength moving forward will be based on its ability “to be lean and agile and entrepreneurial.”​​

Board member Elizabeth Shelby similarly voted for the proposal.

“It’s incumbent upon us to plan as we must for the next several years, even if that requires additional cuts,” she said.

But Hala Schepmann, a board member and chair of SOU’s chemistry and physics department, opposed the plan, calling it “the nuclear option.”

“Do we need to make immediate cuts? Yes,” she said. “But taking away key foundational components of our institution will make it harder for us to make progress.”

Schepmann also took issue with deciding on the plan amid “significant fluctuations” in the university’s projected budget.

This summer, SOU lowered projections for its expected revenue by $1.9 million after an internal analysis found “a multi-decade issue” of double-counting some online education tuition revenue.

The workforce reduction comes just two years after SOU eliminated nearly 82 full-time positions through a combination of layoffs, unfilled vacancies, voluntary reductions and retirements. 

That wave of cuts left the remaining employees “feeling as though they were asked to do more with less,” according to the proposal. It argued that the new round of cuts will address this issue by paring down programs in tandem with shrinking the workforce.