THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, August 23, 1994 TAG: 9408230425
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PHILIP WALZER, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium: 65 lines
University officials from across Virginia promised legislators Monday that they will increase professors' teaching loads, drop unpopular courses, slice administrative costs and increase the use of technology to save the state millions of dollars.
The College of William and Mary, for instance, will reduce administrative costs by 10 percent, saving $2.1 million, and drop 10 percent of its courses, Vice President Samuel E. Jones said. The University of Virginia plans to boost teaching loads and cut its enrollment of graduate students by 5 percent.
``Faculty are going to be spending more time on undergraduate teaching,'' said Leonard W. Sandridge Jr., executive vice president at U.Va. ``We are concentrating on long-term adjustments to the way we do business, not just quick fixes.''
Officials from three other schools - George Mason, Norfolk State and Virginia Commonwealth - and the community-college system spoke before the Higher Education Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee. Their testimony offered a preview of the restructuring plans that colleges must submit to the state on Sept. 1.
The chairman of the subcommittee, Del. Alan A. Diamonstein, D-Newport News, who has criticized colleges for failing to streamline, said after the hearing that the schools are finally on course. ``I am pleased with the fact that they recognized the legislative requirement for restructuring,'' he said. ``All of them are showing an effort to keep their costs down.''
The General Assembly has required the colleges to submit restructuring plans this year and next. If state officials or legislators find a lack of progress by next fall, a college could lose 1.5 percent of its state funding.
These were the highlights of the proposals:
Academic cuts. VCU this summer closed two schools - the School of Basic Health Sciences and the School of Community and Public Affairs - by merging them into other sections, Provost Grace E. Harris said. Norfolk State this year merged its journalism and mass communications departments, President Harrison B. Wilson said.
Technology. Most colleges said they were increasing the use of technology to reach more students. At George Mason, English chairman Hans Bergmann doubled the size of his American fiction course and used electronic mail as the primary means of communicating with students. ``The responses were much more intense and much more sophisticated than anything I ever got out of my students,'' said George Mason President George W. Johnson.
Privatization. Norfolk State this month turned over its food-service operation to Marriott Management Services Corp. and Thompson Hospitality of Reston, Va. At William and Mary, the bookstore was taken over by Barnes & Noble, which spent half a million dollars for renovations, Jones said.
Security. Norfolk State often uses students, instead of security guards, as ``gatekeepers'' to check cars as they enter the campus. William and Mary is reducing the number of police administrators to get more guards on the street.
Job training. The community-college system will launch a statewide job-training program, taught by professors and industry workers.
Diamonstein offered the most enthusiastic praise for William and Mary's plan, which also calls for eliminating some graduate programs, exploring whether to expand summer school and reducing the number of credits required for graduation from 124 to 120. ``I think you've hit it right on the head,'' he said. ``It's exactly what we're looking for.'' by CNB