With President Nancy Dye absent on a fundraising trip to Florida, College decision-makers presented a plan to the faculty which includes cutting the size of Oberlin’s faculty and student body over the next five years in order to reduce the College’s $1.5 million structural budget deficit.

Dean of the College Jeffrey Whitmer, Provost Clayton Koppes, and Vice President of Finance Ron Watts faced a critical faculty at the latest of a series of budget meetings on Wednesday.

The plan calls for a reduction of $2.7 million in operating expenses. This will involve cutting the size of Oberlin’s student body to 2,720 from its current size of around 2,800. Thirty-three of these students will be from the College of Arts and Sciences and 47 from the Conservatory. Oberlin plans to maintain the current student-faculty ratio by eliminating seven faculty positions from the College and five from the Conservatory. The College also plans to cut 10 administrative and staff positions. As of yet, no announcement has been made regarding which positions will be cut but it will likely depend largely on retirements and resignations over the next few years. “Eleven staff positions are also being looked into for elimination,” Watts said.

According to Whitmer, the news of these cuts was disclosed to the faculty during a series of meetings over Winter Term.

“These are difficult choices to make but the alternatives may be far worse,” Watts said. The cuts are intended to increase tuition revenue per student by three to six percent over the next five years. According to Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Grover Zinn, the Educational Plans and Policies Committee will take a “proactive” role in deciding which faculty positions to cut.

“The committees will have a major responsibility in providing both process and consideration for the reduction of teaching staff that will be necessary,” he said.

Staff cuts of this scale are an unprecedented measure for the College.

“We’ve never cut faculty positions before since I’ve been here,” said Zinn, who was hired in 1966.

Additional revenue-increasing measures will include cutting the number of sabbatical replacements hired by the College, increasing student loan requirements and increasing student room occupancy rates.

“Oberlin effectively becomes a residential college again,” said Watts, who outlined a plan for constructing new housing so that around 2,600 students will eventually live on campus. This figure includes students living in Oberlin Student Cooperative Assocation housing.

Following the College’s decision in December to suspend the Danenberg Oberlin-in-London program as a cost-cutting measure, Watts announced the College’s intention to begin charging students a $1,000 fee for study abroad.

“The study-away fee offsets the money that the College sends out when students go overseas,” said Whitmer.

Several faculty members questioned whether the suspension of the London program coupled with this new measure contradicted language in the current strategic planning draft, which calls for “creating meaningful international study and research for every student...who desires such experience.”

Provost Clayton Koppes did not feel that the fee went against the goals of the plan.

“I don’t think that because something is valuable it needs to be given away for free,” he said.

Several faculty members attending the meeting voiced frustration that the decisions had been made without much consultation from faculty.

“This should have been done with more faculty discussion,” said one faculty member. “We haven’t been part of this at all.”

The faculty will meet again today to discuss the new strategic planning report, which did not fit onto Wednesday’s agenda.