December 18, 2024

This message is sent on behalf of Dilson Rassier, provost and vice-president, academic and chief budget officer. It has been sent to all faculty and staff.

As I shared recently, we are anticipating another tight budget cycle. New changes in government policies, particularly those affecting international student enrolment and visa regulations, continue to negatively impact income. We know we have a challenging few years ahead.

During the last fiscal year, we reduced our budget by $50M. These reductions were found almost entirely within administration; non-academic units across the university sustained significant cuts while faculties did not receive a budget cut, although we recognize that due to inflation they had budget pressures as well. As we have made these difficult decisions, it is important to remember that administrative units and administrative staff contribute significantly to the academic mission of the university. Delivering on our purpose—to create and connect knowledge, learning and community for deeper understanding and meaningful impact—requires effort and commitment from all parts of the organization.

Through budget cuts for administrative units, a staff hiring freeze (reducing job postings by almost 50 percent since 2022 levels), and more than 80 staff position eliminations at all levels across the university, our teams made difficult decisions to manage fiscal realities while ensuring focus on SFU’s strategic plan and academic mission. These initiatives were reinforced by structural changes that moved different portfolios, including the campuses in Surrey and Vancouver and the different offices for community engagement, into the provost's office.

This work put us on the right path, and indeed we had balanced the budget for the year ahead. Unfortunately, ongoing changes impacting international enrolment from the federal government announced over the past months—the most recent being November 15—continue to catch the sector by surprise and dramatically reduce our projected income. We are now predicting an operating budget shortfall of approximately $20M for the next fiscal year, and the situation is still highly unpredictable with potentially more changes to come.

Universities in B.C. cannot run a deficit; therefore, we need to take steps now to ensure we balance our budget while we simultaneously make plans for next year.

To that end, last week Peter Hall, AVP, Academic, and I announced a selective hiring freeze on continuing faculty positions. This selective hiring freeze is temporary, only applies to continuing positions, and has several exceptions. It does not impact the School of Medicine, which is currently funded by the government.

The selective continuing faculty hiring freeze, combined with the ongoing staff hiring freeze, another year of budget cuts for administrative units, and several other initiatives and cost-saving measures that will be shared in the new year, will allow us to manage the new and continuing budget pressures. Each of these actions is intended to bring stability to our university during a volatile period.

This is a difficult time, and I am grateful to all of you for your hard work.

Sincerely,

Dilson Rassier

Provost and Vice-President, Academic

Chief Budget Officer

Simon Fraser University