“Frustrated, angry, tired.” These three words, professors say, describe the feelings of non-tenure track faculty as Whitman College’s budget cuts become a reality. Cuts have already led to the elimination of one teaching position, and an extensive reduction in contracts which Professors say may threaten faculty care benefits. 

A main cause of frustration amongst faculty is in extensive cuts to the introductory writing course, RWPD-170, which has been reduced from fourteen sections to four. This ten section cut is the equivalent of two full time teaching positions and is estimated to save the college $182,000. Along with reducing sections, the college has eliminated the writing assessment, a test previously administered to incoming freshmen, which professors say provide crucial data about incoming students’ writing skill. 

Professor Georgia Cloepfil is the assistant coach for Whitman’s women’s soccer team. She used to teach one section of RWPD-170 per semester, and is no longer teaching because of the cuts to the program. 

“I will no longer be teaching next year, It’s very sad. I really, really love working with students in that way. I love working with faculty in that way and being involved with the school in that capacity,” Cloepfil said. 

Cloepfil received her masters of fine arts in creative nonfiction writing from the University of Idaho and she just published a memoir titled The Striker and the Clock, which has received acclaim from both the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times. 

Cloepfil describes the impact of no longer teaching as both emotional and financial. 

Teaching this course “makes up half of my salary. I frankly can’t live on my full time staff salary that I make from Whitman. With a kid and the cost of living it is very challenging,” Cloepfil said. 

The RWPD-170 course is taught by the writing program faculty in the Rhetoric, Writing, and Public Discourse Department. All of the writing program faculty teaching the course are adjunct, non-tenure track professors. 

Head of the Writing Proficiency Program Professor Jenna Terry, Senior Lecturer of RWPD and General Studies, says the ten section reduction will result in lesser instructional expenses, like salary and health benefits. The Wire has confirmed that at least three professors in the program will have reduced course loads next year. 

Multiple sources have confirmed that the $182,000 savings are from savings in salary and other personnel expenses. 

“It’s the salary and the OPE [Other Personnel Expenses] for ten fewer sections calculated by multiplying the adjunct rate, plus OPE, which accounts for things like benefits, taxes, the costs of the college’s contributions towards social security, Medicare, retirement… It’s a combination of salary that goes directly to those folks who have lower employment, as well as the cost of having employees,” Terry said. 

Professor Michael Simon, the Non-Tenure Track Faculty Representative on the Elected Chairs Committee, says, “It’s awful… I mean, I know these people. I’ve worked with them for a really long time and this is awful because many of them had cuts during the [Financial Sustainability Review] too.” Simon describes the general atmosphere among non-tenure track faculty as “frustrated, angry, tired… very wary, and frankly just worn out and feeling like we’re constantly fighting for our jobs.”

“The President’s Cabinet acknowledges that while the budget-balancing process was designed to not disproportionately impact any single vice presidential division, reducing budgets is a difficult process that is experienced in different ways across the campus community. This work does affect employees in very real ways, but it is also central to our shared duties of stewardship and fiduciary responsibility,”said Vice President for Finance and Administration Jeff Hamrick’s, published responses to the Wire’s inquiry.

“The generational cliff is definitely the most important part of this,” Bolton published, “Whitman college projects that we will receive $39.3 million in net tuition (tuition paid by students and families after scholarships are granted) next year, compared to $42 million this year.  We will also have a small decrease in revenue from the endowment, from $37.1 million to $36.8 million.”  

President of Whitman’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors, Professor Jack Jackson, says the chapter is concerned about the RWPD-170 cuts and is currently gathering information on the issue. 

 “The Whitman-AAUP chapter has serious questions and concerns as to whether the timing of the reduction of sections offered just and appropriate notice to non-tenure track faculty teaching in that program.”

Professor Lydia McDermott, Chair of the Arts and Humanities Division, says that there is not a baseline number of RWPD-170 sections offered each year. 

“This year we had 14 and next year only 4 have been approved in the regular requests for staffing that happen yearly. This obviously has large effects on NTT [Non-Tenure Track] writing faculty who have been teaching for years when there have been many more sections. I cannot speak to any individual contracts, but their morale is certainly low. I find all of our current budget cuts distressing” McDermott wrote to the Wire in an email. 

“In a Supreme Court case called Yeshiva v. NLRB (1980), the Supreme Court limited the unionization rights of tenured and tenure-track faculty at private colleges and universities. However, in recent years the law has recognized a right of many contingent or non-tenure-track faculty at private colleges to unionize. The decision on unionization rests with the non-tenure-track faculty,” Jackson noted. 

President Sarah Bolton introduced these changes to the Whitman community in a February 21st email titled “Budget Reduction Proposals for Community Feedback.”  

“These savings are needed because we expect our resources will decrease (from $97.3 million this year to 96.3 million next year) while at the same time there are cost increases due to inflation and raises needed because of the rising cost of living,” wrote Bolton.

Associate Professor of Politics and Chair of the Faculty, Susanne Beechey, told the Wire via email that the proposal to reduce the number of RWPD-170 sections has been approved. This comes before the March 10 deadline for community feedback. 

In a published response to the Wire’s inquiry about this contradiction, President Bolton wrote, “we probably should have put a note on that item to make clear that there had already been a decision.” Moreover, Bolton wrote that though “raises are not uniformly distributed for all employees, many continuing non-tenure track faculty are eligible to receive raises,” when asked about the raises mentioned in her email to the community.

“We think RWPD-170 is a great course taught by excellent faculty, but we also know that demand for the course will be significantly lower without the placement [test],” Beechey wrote. 

President Bolton wrote in an email that the finalized budget cuts were included in the budget proposal so that all of the budgeting decisions could be viewed in totality. 

Simon explains that Whitman uses a system called “Full Time Equivalency” or FTE to evaluate salary and OPE every time a contract is renewed. 

“Full Time Equivalency at Whitman is five courses over the course of one academic year. So each full course is in effect .2 FTE,” Simon said. 

Erika Cerda is Whitman’s Associate Vice President for Human Resources. 

“Full time equivalency (FTE) at Whitman is a standard calculation indicating the annual workload of the position. We do not require a 1.0 FTE for any employed member of our faculty or staff to qualify for benefits… regular employees who work between .44-.75 FTE are eligible for part-time employee benefits,” Cerda published. 

Provost and Dean of Students, Elisabeth Mermann-Jozwiak, explained the reasoning behind the cuts in an email to the Wire, 

“There were both financial and pedagogical considerations. On the one hand, there was a need to contribute towards reaching the College’s target for reductions. On the other hand, the Committee of Division Chairs recommended to end the required summer writing assessment since high stakes, one-time testing does not lead to students’ best work.”

Jeffery K. Grim, Assistant Professor at George Mason University’s Higher Education Program, contextualizes the conflicting impulses a College must balance. 

“There are SO many things to balance when operating a university: financial obligations and sustainability, values, academic freedom, learning, inclusion, etc. With any organization and any decision, administrators (and other stakeholders) should rely on their espoused mission and values. Those statements are the social contract administrators “sign” when they accept a position and when students enroll,” Grim said 

The college is still considering what the future of the writing proficiency requirement will look like. More budget cuts are likely to be made as the college’s budget balancing process continues into the next academic year.