COMMENTS FROM OP SIX ON 2013 REVIEW OF SIX-YEAR PLANS
General Comments
4. Classified Staff: If you plan to add classified staff, please add the following two lines to the summary of the Academic and Financial Plan in Part I and update as appropriate –
This information has been added to the plan.
8. Staff salary increases: If you plan to increase staff salaries, please add the following lines:
This information has been provided in item 2. a. Recruit and Retain Top Talent. The requested funding would provide a salary increase of 4.5% in both years for support staff which includes both administrative faculty and classified staff.
Institution Specific Comments
George Mason University
· Please provide additional information on your analysis for the proposed consolidation and/or elimination of some of your institutes and the reallocations and/or savings that might result.
Mason has only a few existing institutes and these are not anticipated to overlap with or shift resources to the new institute for Modeling, Simulation and Game Design. The Krasnow Institute is an academic unit as well as a research institute. The Keller Institute for disAbilities is service-based, and the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy is a research institute. Mason’s English Language Institute is a self-supporting institute that provides training and support for individuals whose first language is not English. Other institutes are external organizations that are affiliates or partners with the university but they receive limited, if any, financial support from the university either monetary or in-kind. The majority of Mason’s research centers were established to generate revenue for the university and most are centers in name only. As a result, they receive little to no funding from the university. While these centers may engage in research conducted in collaboration with the new Institute, the institute is not expected to replace any centers at this time. That said, the sharing of resources will be encouraged as the university seeks to realize efficiencies across all aspects of the institution and across agencies.
· Please elaborate on the performance metrics being utilized to evaluate the outcomes of your current student success programs and please provide data on those outcomes. In addition, please provide a detailed breakdown on how the $650,000 budget request for student success programs would be utilized and the timeline for the utilization.
Requested resources will be used to support additional advising staff and as well as operating costs to cover software contracts, membership in the Student Success Collaborative, and training for Mason advisors, faculty, and students in the use of the tools.
Success metrics will focus on student progression through the educational system and will include retention rates and four, five, and six-year graduation rates. Mason has seen a significant increase in these measures over the past five years. The first-year retention rate for in-state full-time freshmen has increased by 3%; the second-year retention rate has grown by 3.7%; and the third-year retention rate has grown by 5.5%. The change in graduation rates is similar, yet more pronounced over the five-year period with an increased number of student graduating in four and five years. Mason’s four-year graduation rate grew by 6%, the five-year rate grew by 6.1% and the six-year rate grew by 2.3%. Going forward, we will also monitor student progression in terms of credit hours earned at critical points in a student’s academic career to ensure an increasing number of students are on-track for timely graduation. The Student Success Collaborative will enable us to identify other early indicators such as performance in key foundational courses within each major.
Mason will be adding two full-time professional advisors to support these initiatives (FTE E&G $160,000). Operating costs include membership in the Student Success Collaborative, Campus Lab products, DegreeWorks and costs associated with training advisors, faculty, and students in the use of these tools ($90,000). Distribution of resources for FY16 includes FTE E&G of $160,000 and operating expenditures of $240,000.
· Please provide greater detail on your budget request of $15.8 million to recruit and retain top talent by explaining how the funds would be allocated.
The requested funding would provide a salary increase of 4.5% in both years for Assistant and Associate Professor levels as well as Administrative Faculty and Classified Staff. In addition, the requested funding would increase the salary scale for Graduate Teaching Assistants in both years by 4.5%. Further, the funding will provide faculty start-up packages for approximately 15 new faculty in the first year and 30 in the second year. This initiative requests General Funds to support approximately two-third the costs with the remaining one-third funded by Non-General Funds.
· Please provide additional information regarding your potential sources of and amounts for reallocation/savings.
Efficiency and Effectiveness savings being reallocated to faculty salaries are projected to be $500,000 in the first year and $1,000,000 in the second year. Potential sources for savings include process improvement, reorganization, and direct expenditure budget realignment.
Please provide additional details on the initiatives that might fall into the category of “targets of opportunity” on page 3 of your academic/financial plan.
The request for resources for “targets of opportunity” are for specific unit initiatives that will arise out of the university’s strategic initiatives or will be necessary to provide the infrastructure needed to realize the strategic goals such as the upgrade of the current IT reporting tool to a new more sophisticated business intelligence tool, revamping the budget model to preserve Mason’s ability to remain nimble while meeting the operational needs of the university, creating nonprofit partnerships with groups such as an international recruiting company, and other initiatives yet to be clarified through the unit strategic planning process currently underway. These initiatives could relate to the strategies outlined in the plan such as initiatives to support innovative teaching, exploration of new technologies for teaching, or as yet unidentified infrastructure and start-up needs to support research goals.
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