Presidential Review Committee Update

As most of the UNLV campus knows, I have been elected by the faculty Senate to chair the Presidential Review committee. For the next month or so, while that committee does its work, I'll be limiting posts on this site to NFA and Higher Ed matters unrelated to UNLV's program review. This statement is on behalf of the Presidential Review Committee to update our colleagues on our process:

The Presidential Review Committee yesterday (Monday March 22) received its formal charge from President Smatresk. We also received the proposed list of academic programs to review and other proposed academic affairs cuts (which has now been distributed to the campus) and accompanying budget data from the Provost’s office. We expect to receive the proposed list for cuts in other vice-presidential areas in about a week.

The committee is charged recommend a prioritized list for the university president to consider in making his recommendations to the Regents for any program terminations. We have been asked to do so by the end of the third week of April, to enable subsequent bodies to review our recommendations before the go to the president – who in turn must make recommendations to the Board of Regents by May 4.

In the weeks to come, the PRC will be meeting regularly. We will consider whether any additional programs should be added to the list for review and whether all programs currently on the list should be included in our recommended prioritizations. We will also seek input directly from all programs and departments specified for review and expect to be in contact with administrators, faculty and students from those programs. Within the narrow time constraints imposed on this process, we will seek to consult as broadly as possible and to deliberate as fully and serenely as possible.

During that period, we have agreed to maintain discretion and confidentiality about our deliberations and not to make any final decisions until we have completed our deliberations. Because we will seek to work by consensus, we appeal to our colleagues to minimize efforts to lobby or cajole any particular committee member, which are unlikely to be very influential on our process in any event.
While none of us is eager to complete the task before us, we will seek to do it in as professional, diligent, thorough and impartial a manner as possible.