UNBC, CNC, Present Accomplishments, Challenges
UNBC’s Angela Kehler & Dr. Daniel Weeks – photo 250 News
Prince George, B.C. – The University of Northern BC and the College of New Caledonia presented its accomplishments and challenges to the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services this evening at the Ramada Hotel in downtown Prince George.
UNBC president Daniel Weeks boasted of the schools proven ability to keep its graduates in the north noting “we produce more grads in the north than all other universities in BC combined – and about 75% of the students who graduate stay in the north.”
He admitted however that they haven’t been entirely filling projected regional needs in engineering and health science professionals and could use the government’s support.
When it comes to health in particular, Weeks said there continues to be a great need for nurses in BC’s northeast and in physiotherapy across the region.
Student Society president Angela Kehler added government could aid the process by providing financial incentives to bring people to the north along with financial relief.
CNC president Henry Reiser presented the all-party committee with a more dire overview however stating the college “has experienced $9.67 million in deficit budget since 2008 with an additional $1.8 million in reductions expected in 2015/16.”
He warned that may result in reduced program offerings at all six of CNC’s campuses, possible program cancellations, reductions to services and further employee lay-offs.
Reiser did offer solutions however.
For example, he said that if the school could charge the BC average for its trades training (it charges 18.2% less than the BC average) in the form of standardized tuition, it could generate an estimated $1.4 million annually.
Failing that, he proposed that the government create a northern allowance “to help offset the issues surrounding its vast service area and climate.”
Despite the challenges Reiser also spoke of the success CNC has had in graduating aboriginal students (17.4% of students) and in graduating students who’ve stayed in the north and contributed to its economy ($201.7 million in 2013).
The all-party committee now heads to Vancouver tomorrow before wrapping up its province wide tour October 15.
The information gained from the sessions will be presented in the form of a report to the Legislature in November and be considered by the Ministry of Finance when making next year’s provincial budget.
Comments
Currently UNBC and CNC utilization rate is less than 100%. It means that they are being funded by BC government for a target number of student seats which is several hundreds more than the actual number of students enrolled.
In the case of UNBC we are speaking about 700 empty funded student seats (FTE) annually and if we multiply this number by around 13,000$ per student (FTE) funding, then we are talking about at least $9 Millions extra funding to UNBC annually. What UNBC president will do if this $9 Million extra funding is removed from UNBC budget next year? I doubt that he has an answer to it if 250news.com ask him next time; and I assume that that this extra $9M funding annually (and why no rationale for paying it) is now on the radar.
If we ask Dr Weeks how UNBC managed to reach 700 FTE short? He may not know the answer right now. I can answer the second question. The way to solve the problem is to find out the root causes of it first, and to encourage the critics to come forward to help you to brain storm the issue. I don’t see such a culture of critical thinking in UNBC and UNBC is in this dire situation because it has ignored its critics for a very long time. UNBC allowed 250 empty seats turn into 700 empty seats and snowball into more than $9 Million shortfall annually.
Prof, it is really simple demographics. There are fewer students in the K-12 system now throughout the North. (except maybe for the Peace). Look at all the school closures in SD57 alone over the past 10 years.
Not to say that UNBC or CNC haven’t made some blunders along the way. But nothing they have done caused the demographic shifts and reduced number of potential Northern applications.
Looking at UNBC’s institutional research report, there has been a decrease in FTE from 3310 in 2006 to 3098 last year, a drop of around 6%. I’m not clear on how this translates into 700 empty seats.
As for the college, I believe their enrollment is up over last year although not quite back to the levels of a few years ago after the North American economy largely tanked. There has always been a fairly linear relationship between employment rates and post-secondary enrollment and unemployment is fairly low right now. Once unemployment rises, so will attendance at UNBC and CNC.
Meanwhile, due to government policies, the college is trapped into their financial morass because they charged the second lowest tuition in the province when the policy of capping tuition came into place. As a result, they’ve never been able to catch up since some of the costs they cannot control (e.g., cost of heating) have surged far ahead of the maximum 2% increase in tuition per annum they can charge students. This needs to be addressed by the province.
700 (around) is the difference between the ‘target’ funded FTE and ‘actual’ FTE in UNBC, see the graph in April 2013 UNBC senate public report and I agree that demographics is part of the problem in both CNC and UNBC, but the management in TRU in Kamloops is doing a much better job in keeping its costs down and attracting students. I don’t know very much detail about CNC cost breakdown and management mistakes, but I have analyzed UNBC system in great detail over a decade and half. I see lots of waste and mismanagement in the UNBC system. One positive thing that Dr Cozzetto did was to hire a company to compare UNBC processes and costs with other universities with the same size. Their conclusion was that UNBC has over-spending problem.
Cozzetto’s mistake was to lay off faculty and staff instead of removing bad managers like Dean McGill and find and fix the sources of overspending leaks in UNBC. The Karma of carpet lay offs later caught up with Cozzetto. Iwama’s mistake was to ask for more and more money to continue overspending and he fired Macnamara instead of removing Dr Dale who has turned into a puppet in the hands of our NRES puppetmaster. Iwama was tempted and pressured to follow the path of less resistance in UNBC after Cozzeto’s sudden exit.
Is Dr Weeks going to follow the Iwama’s deadend path in UNBC? or is he going to trailblaze a new path by putting an end to this grim puppet show in UNBC? My management professor 24 years ego taught us that management is both an art and science. UNBC needs ‘better management’ and ‘less politics’ to change the toxic environment into a collegial environment once again.
The 3rd question that Dr Weeks in UNBC must answer is: Where this $9 Milllion extra un-utilized funding in UNBC is wasted each year? Actually the number becomes $20 Million if UNBC is paid the BC average $10000 per enrolled student FTE (like SFU, UVic, TRU). He cannot lay off 150 faculty and staff positions in UNBC to eliminate it. Can he? I want to meet him and talk about this if he is available.
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