After the Board of Trustees passed the Gold+ plan on March 19, the initiative to reduce administrative structure and costs in the Division of Academic Affairs is in full swing. 

The Gold+ plan, the finalized T28 model which beat out eight others, will reorganize the Division of Academic Affairs into three main areas sharing resources, eliminate numerous academic leadership positions and save the university an estimated $1.5 million. 

Melody Tankersley, executive vice president and provost, oversaw the T28 initiative since its inception in spring last year. She said T28 will eliminate “redundancies” in administration and help the university face the upcoming enrollment drop among college students. 

“If we can’t be efficient, then we can’t operate and do what we are here to do, which is to educate,” Tankersley said. “We have to be able to work within a budget that is continuing to be impacted by a lot of things around us.”   

While there are financial fears pushing the backing behind T28, Tankersley said the university is mindfully planning for its future and not reaching a breaking point. 

“We’re not in a position of desperation like a lot of universities around us,” she said. “We’re purposefully reducing our costs so that we’re steady over time.”

Aside from keeping the university afloat financially, Tankersley also hopes T28 will create “next-generation degrees” based on disciplines working together. 

“We know that moving forward, a lot of careers are going to depend on interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approaches to solving problems,” she said. “We’re always looking to be first class, providing what students want, what our community wants and what the world wants in terms of people entering the workforce.” 

The beginning process for T28 began in October, when administration dealt with surveys and discussions at all university levels to identify a plan to move forward. Tracy Laux, faculty senate chair and senior lecturer in the Department of Mathematical Sciences, played a major role in organizing those discussions. 

He said the process to select a model was long and challenging, and that the final model was not necessarily well-liked, but more so “tolerable” for faculty and staff. 

“A lot of faculty would say, ‘Let’s not do anything,’ and that’s not on the table because of the financial challenges,” Laux said. “That model we came up with was less offensive to everybody.” 

For the purpose of fairness, all decisions regarding tooling academic leadership positions stemmed from data and numbers, according to Laux. For example, having chairs oversee departments depended on the department’s size of faculty, programs and degrees. 

“I’m from the math department, which is one of the largest on campus, and two, maybe three other departments all together still wouldn’t have the same number of faculty or programs,” Laux said. “That’s where the efficiencies are — having some of the smaller, still individual units, but having one chair oversee them.” 

The process also aimed to remain fair by giving faculty and staff ample opportunities to share their thoughts on the matter, and to make sure the disciplines made sense for how and why they were connected, according to Tankersley. 

Despite the daunting process of choosing a final model, Laux and Tankersley said they were both proud of the way faculty and staff came together to work toward that goal. Laux also said he was glad faculty made their voices heard and gave their honest opinions.

“I get nervous when you have a room of close to 50 senators and they agree 100% about everything — that’s just not right,” he said. “To me, that means people aren’t really comfortable saying what they want to say, but for this, we didn’t have a 100% agreement along the way in any of this.”

Although many faculty and staff were skittish of T28, some welcomed the change to allow certain programs and schools to rethink what colleges they should belong to, according to Tankersley and Laux. Some examples include the Sport Administration program becoming a part of the Ambassador Crawford College of Business and Entrepreneurship and the School of Health Sciences leaving the College of Education. 

“This was an opportunity that universities normally don’t do, is to sit back and look at the alignment and say, ‘Does this still make sense?”’ Laux said. “That part to me is a lot of the excitement.” 

Following the vote to approve a final T28 model, Tankersley said staff are feeling a sense of uncertainty and worry for what their future holds. She said the hope is that no staff will be fired from the university if they lose their administrative positions and that they will return to full-time faculty positions. 

Tankersley added the university-wide hiring freeze will help these staff members find new roles within Kent State. 

“That’s why we haven’t gotten straight into answers for staff yet, because we’re still trying to work around the openings and new opportunities,” she said. “That’s our next big step, and we’ve been working on that to get them some clarity and real information so they can feel good about what’s happening next.” 

Although Tankersley has high optimism the hiring freeze will help all eliminated staff members find new roles, she said there is still a possibility some will be fired. 

“Can I tell you that no one will be fired? Absolutely not,” she said. “I don’t know what it’s going to look like at that point … it’s still months away.” 

Laux and Tankersley said they both feel content with the finalized T28 model, and they understand there may be growing pains along the way. However, they are both confident this initiative will strengthen the university. 

“It does what the university needs it to do,” Tankersley said. “We’ll continue to thrive.” 

John Engoglia is a beat reporter. Contact him at [email protected].