THE AUFA PRESIDENT COMMUNICATES

Budget Priorities

Every year, the Canadian Centre for Educational Statistics (Statistics Canada) provides analyses of data obtained from the Canadian Association of University Business Officers (CAUBO) on how universities in Canada spend their money. General operating expenditures are reported as a percentage of the total budget, broken down into the following categories: administration, computing services, library, non-credit courses, instruction, external, physical plant, and students. These financial statistics are in turn reviewed by the Canadian Association of University Teachers (CAUT) and provided to faculty associations across Canada. The data are reported, for comparison purposes, in several different groupings. The first group compares all universities and colleges in Canada. Further reports group universities and colleges into the categories used for the annual MacLean’s magazine rankings, as well by province, and individual institution.

I recently received the statistics from CAUT for 2007 – 2008. (Data are not yet available for 2008 – 2009). Those of you who attended our October general membership meeting will have already seen some of these results, but they are worth repeating because I believe that they offer some insights into Acadia’s current budgetary difficulties.

The following chart shows how Canadian universities on average spent their money in 2007 – 2008. Of total general operating expenditures, 11% was spent on administration, 4% on computing, 4% on library, 3% on non-credit, 57% on instruction, 2% on external, 11% on physical plant, and 8% on students. It makes sense, and is reassuring to see, that the largest percentage of expenditures in Canadian universities is in the category of instruction as this should indeed be the top priority in any institution that has education as its main mission.

The data shown below for Acadia’s comparison group in the annual MacLean’s ranking of universities — the primarily undergraduate group — repeat the trends we see in Canadian universities in general, with some variations, notably in the total percentage of the general operating expenditures devoted to instruction. Here, the percentage has fallen from 57% to 54%. In this group, administration now accounts for 13% of expenditures, while computing and library remain at 4% each. Physical plant has risen to 12%, non-credit has dropped to 2%, and the amount spent on students has risen to 9%.

What happens when we look at the percentages for universities in Nova Scotia? Once again, the results are similar. Instruction accounts for 55% of general operating expenditures, while library and computing remain consistent at 4% each. Administration accounts for 11% of expenditures, non-credit for 3%, external for 2%, physical plant for 12% and students for 9%. There are currently 11 universities in Nova Scotia, and the data from Acadia are of course included in the percentages reported in the following graph:

If we take a look at how we spend our money at Acadia, you will notice some surprising, and quite frankly alarming differences. At Acadia, instruction accounts for less than half of general operating expenditures. In fact, in 2007 – 2008, only 47% of our expenditures were devoted to instruction. What accounts for this difference? As the chart below demonstrates, at Acadia we spend more money on administration (15%) and on computing (8%) than almost any other institution in Nova Scotia, in the MacLean’s group of primarily undergraduate universities, and in Canadian universities in general. We also spend more on students (11%), slightly more on the library (5%), slightly less on external (1%) and non-credit (1%), and roughly the same on physical plant (12%).

Here is a chart which shows how Acadia fares with its three comparison groups. It is easy to see where the main differences are: more is spent on our campus on administration and computing, but less on instruction.

Clearly, a university that allocates less than 50% of its total expenditures to instruction does not have its priorities right. Was 2007 – 2008 an anomalous year? Unfortunately, this is not the case. I have looked back over the data reported for the past four years to see what the trends in spending have been. The percentage of money we have spent annually on instruction has been steadily falling, from 50% in 2005 to our current low of 47%. The percentage of money spent on administration has risen during that same time period, from 12 or 13% to our current high of 15%. The amount of spending on students has also risen, from 9 to 11%, even though enrollment has fallen over that same period.

Four year trend at Acadia

	2005	2006	2007	2008
Administration	13%	12%	13%	15%
Computing	8%	8%	9%	8%
Library	4%	5%	5%	5%
Non-credit	2%	1%	1%	1%
Instruction	50%	51%	49%	47%
External	2%	1%	1%	1%
Physical Plant	12%	11%	11%	12%
Students	9%	11%	11%	11%

AUFA members have fought hard over the past few contract negotiations to ensure that appropriate resources go to support the core service of the university: instruction. It is disheartening to see this chronic underfunding of the academic sector continue, and in fact worsen. Rather than reversing this trend by committing a larger percentage of its financial resources to instruction, the BoG has made a series of decisions in the past few months that further undermine the academic sector and the instructional mission of the University. Support staff in both SEIU and AUPAT have been forced to take 6 days of unpaid vacation, which has resulted in office closures and reduced services to faculty and students. Our departmental secretaries play a central role in our efforts to recruit and retain students. Forcing secretaries to take unpaid vacation and close departmental offices is a short-sighted effort at cost reduction which ignores the importance of the interaction between support staff, students and their families in our overall recruitment efforts.

I recently received the financial information the Board is required to provide AUFA under the terms of article 28.10. Among the reports the BoG must make available is a list of employee complement for all non-academic units. The total number of employees working in non-academic units in 2009 is 144.7. Here is the break-down of the units and the number of employees:

Non-Academic Unit	Employee Complement
VP Administration / Office	2
Facilities Management	2
Financial Services (Business Office, Student Accounts, Financial Aid, Post Office, Print Shop, Purchasing)	24
Human Resources	8
Safety and Security	7
Technology Services	33
Varsity Athletics	9
VP Advancement/Office	2
Alumni Affairs	3
Development	3
Communications & Marketing	4
Hospitality & Events	3
Student Recruitment	9
Cooperative Education & Career Services (dept. no longer exists)	0
BoG Office/FOIPOP Administrator	1
Chaplaincy	1
Equity Office	0
K. C. Irving Environmental Science Centre	5
President /Office	2
Student Affairs (Residence Life, Student Health, Resource Centre)	13.7
Registrar’s Office/Admissions	13
TOTAL	144.7

The number of employees at Acadia in non-academic units seems to me to be relatively high, when we compare it with the total number of tenure-stream professors (182) and Librarians (8) required under the Collective Agreement. Given the BoG’s recent refusal to honour its commitment to maintain minimum numbers of Professors and Librarians, it seems unlikely we will see a reversal of the trend of diminishing percentages of resources devoted to instruction at Acadia. These numbers explain the discrepancies we have seen in the CAUBO data, and suggest an imbalance in spending priorities at Acadia.

It is time for us to call upon the administration at Acadia to make instruction our top priority by realigning our spending so it is consistent with the trends in other universities across Canada. It is not unreasonable to insist that more than 50% of the yearly expenditures of an institution whose primary mission is education be devoted to the academic sector.

Janice Best

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