On Thursday, the University Senate voted to send back three of the four program elimination proposals to the University Strategic Planning Committee (USPC) and the University Resource Committee for further reconsiderations.
The three proposals that were sent back aimed to eliminate all majors and the minors in the physics department and theater arts department and both bachelor of science and arts degrees in retail merchandising.
The fourth proposal to eliminate the secondary education major in family and consumer science was postponed indefinitely. Bradley’s provost and the chair of USPC, Walter Zakahi, pointed out that the proposal was only made after the committee recommended the elimination of the retail merchandising major, which would undercut the ability to offer the courses needed for the secondary education degree in the department.
Since the recommendation, the curriculum for secondary education in family consumer science has been adjusted and is no longer reliant on the retail merchandising courses.
All four proposals were originally scheduled to be voted on in February. The votes were first delayed to March as the Faculty Handbook, the bonding document for the University Senate, requires the affected departments to provide a written response to the elimination proposal. The voting was later delayed again to April due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The proposals were sent back after senators questioned the cost-saving effectiveness of the eliminations as COVID-19 reshapes the landscape of higher education. The USPC also has not had the chance to discuss the written response from the affected departments.
Program elimination proposals were made based on results produced by the program prioritization effort, which was developed by USPC over the past few years. Its objectives were to identify what it considered underperforming major programs and to help the university invest in high-performance programs. The proposal to eliminate theater majors was brought forward in February by university president Gary Roberts as a senator after USPC voted down the recommendation inside of the committee.
