Provost approves academic cuts
Published: March 8, 2010Section: Breaking News
University Provost Marty Krauss has approved all 17 of the Brandeis 2020 Committee’s proposals to suspend or restructure academic programs in order to save the university $3.8 million annually beginning in 2012. Krauss also altered the Committee’s original proposal to terminate the Ph.D. program in Anthropology and has instead proposed that the program “be retained on a smaller scale,” and only admit students from Brandeis’ master’s degree in anthropology.
Krauss made her announcement Monday afternoon in a campus-wide e-mail. The proposals, which were a reaction to the board of trustees’ January request that the university restructure academics in order to help close a $25 million annual budget gap, will be voted upon by the board at its March 24 meeting.
“I have decided to accept the full set of recommendations of the Brandeis 2020 Committee … so as to hold intact the collective judgment of this broadly-based faculty and student committee,” Krauss wrote in her decision.
Krauss wrote that her decision regarding down-sizing the Anthropology Ph.D. program came after conferring with members of the Anthropology master’s program who told her the university’s Ph.D. program was a factor in their decision to attend Brandeis.
“[Maintaining the Ph.D. program] will maximize the opportunity to maintain the significant revenue stream of the M.A. program, while reducing the cost of the Ph.D. program and limiting it to those students most likely to excel,” Krauss wrote.