On Monday, university president Jesse Rogers told faculty members that Midwestern is not in great budgetary times.

From budget cuts from the state of Texas to the increasing of unfunded mandates and the drop of enrollment that cost the university $2.5 million, Rogers said MSU has lost $12.6 million over the last two years.

A lot of things have changed since August when the administration developed the university budget. The drop of enrollment has forced Rogers and his administration to create alternatives to balance the budget.

“Perhaps I’ve made a mistake in trying to encourage you too much in where we are going because I’ve had these [budget] fears all along as I watched the action in Austin,” Rogers said. “I knew it was going to be difficult.”

He said what the university is currently faced with budget-wise is significantly worse than what he expected.

MSU is faced with a $1.7 million deficit this year that the administration has to fix before November.

Despite the dramatic drop in financing, Rogers said he does not want faculty looking over their shoulders. The university has plans to increase the faculty base salary while balancing the budget.

“I want [faculty] to keep a belief in this university,” he said. “Keep belief in me and the administration that we can operate this university in a high-quality way, but there is no doubt that we have a lot of thinking and planning to do.”

The 2010-2011 academic year was the last time the faculty had a salary increase of three percent.

Compared to other master level intuitions, Midwestern is below average in professor and associate professor salaries. The average professor salary is $82,184 and $66,376 is the associate professor average salary.

The assistant professor salary is above average with $60,629.

“It’s great, but it needs improvement,” he said.

Rogers said the key is reducing our funds this year by delaying facilities projects, using gift funds and slowing staff hirings all by $200,000 each.

About $500,000 is needed a year to balance the $1.7 million budget and Rogers presented faculty salary enhancement plan proposal.

The first plan to increase faculty salaries, professors who teach next summer will be given a pay cut.

“The funds would be probated over existing salaries in each of the colleges and the deans would be asked to distribute the program share of that money with the faculty of the college,” Rogers said. “It will be based on the rank and equity.”

The total savings based on summer 2012 would be $400,000.

“The money from the cut is going back into faculty-base salaries, but the first year the $500,000 is going to come out of the current summer budget,” he said. “We are asking [the faculty] for support. We are in this together. Our objective is to try and raise the nine-month salary and go to predictable summer rate.”

Rogers said professors who are depending on summer classes and overloads aren’t in a good situation.

“I’d rather see larger nine-month contracts that [the faculty] can count on,” he said. “In addition, there will be summer and overload work, but don’t forget we’re adding $1.5 million to the pool of money in order to balance the budget by immediately putting it into next year’s salary. ”

The second budget plan is the Voluntary Separation Program. Faculty members who have ten consecutive years serving at Midwestern and their age plus their service working in the state of Texas equals 80.

Professors who meet these qualifications will be put on temporary leave. They will receive a payout of 50 percent of their budgeted salary to be paid by next September.

Marilyn Fowle´, vice president of business and finance, said this program has been done at other universities with major success.

“It’s a win-win program,” she said. “The folks that are participating in the program get to leave the institution with a nice slump sum of money in their pocket.”

Fowle´ said Midwestern would then gain the flexibility of taking the positions that are vacated and decided whether the slots would be filled with lower-paid instructors or combine the position with something else.

“This is not a retirement program,” she said. “If [faculty] chose to leave the institution and retire then it’s up to them. They can obtain a new position somewhere else.”

Once the board meets, the administration will send notices to faculty members that are eligible.

“Fifty percent of the person’s salary is paid out to them by the 2013 fiscal year,” Fowle´ said. “The other 50 percent would be available for adjunct professor to teach those classes the vacated faculty member would’ve been teaching.”

Fowle´ said then for the 2014 fiscal year that faculty’s full salary would be available to give someone else the position.

“We can choose not to fill it,” she said. “We could fit two positions into one. There is a lot of things we can do to save money.”

There is more than $4 million in salary to faculty that are eligible for this program.

“Not to say everyone is going to take it,” Fowle´ said. “But if half of those professors take it then we can probably save $500,000, which would be the amount we would need to do the faculty salary enhancement plan.”

Rogers said he is committed to higher faculty salaries during the next three years.