Office of International Programs response

October 30, 2017

Dear International Programs Colleagues,

I am writing to follow-up on the recent message from President Shultz regarding the budget. Our President outlined a multi-year strategy to bring spending in line with our available financial resources, and ultimately rebuild WSU’s reserves. To start this process, all units must reduce Permanent Budget Line (PBL) spending by 2.5% this fiscal year. Please note that this is a spending reduction, not a budget cut, which means that even as spending is being reduced, the targeted funds are not being eliminated from our IP budget.

One of the challenging aspects of meeting the spending reduction targets is that throughout the university almost all of the PBL is in salaries.  Consequently, vacant positions will be held open as long as possible, and for the time being only essential positions will be filled.  In addition, we will not be able to award salary increases outside of University planned increases. Finally, we have been advised to reduce or defer travel and other operating expenses that are non-essential.

What does this mean for IP?  First, the expenditure reductions, approximately $50,000 this fiscal year for IP, represent no retreat from our goal of leading WSU’s emergence as one of the most globally impactful land grant universities.  IP leadership will work collaboratively with all of our staff and faculty to minimize the effects of the reductions on our ability to fulfill our mission. Second, we will ask each unit within IP to assess the alignment of its expenditures with its core functions in order to ensure that we are as efficient as possible with our resources.  Third, we will continue to expand entrepreneurial efforts—grants, contracts, and programs—that help meet our goal of internationalization of WSU while also providing revenue for our activities. New revenue that we secure from external sources will allow us to enhance IP programs without being subject to expenditure reduction targets.

As we take more specific steps to implement our spending reductions, I, along with Associate VP Paul Whitney and Finance Director Jami Capps, will work to make sure that all of IP is kept informed of our progress and have opportunities to provide input on budgetary priorities. If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact any of the three of us.

I am very grateful for our remarkable IP team, and I have complete confidence that we will be able to continue the advances we have made together and emerge stronger as the university begins to build reserves again.

Sincerely,

Asif J. Chaudhry, Vice President
Washington State University, International Programs
U.S. Ambassador (Ret.)