Recently, the APSCUF held a meeting for young journalists from seven out of the 14 schools that were selected for retrenchment. These schools include: Edinboro, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Mansfield, Clarion, California University of Pennsylvania, Cheyney University of Pennsylvania, and Lock Haven. This meeting was designed to give out any helpful information on what is to come to each and every one of these schools when the retrenchment happens and give feedback to our campuses and communities.
So far here’s what we know:
- Originally, ten out of fourteen schools were selected, but three schools (Bloomsburg, Kutztown, and Millersville) decided to rescind their letters.
- Professors with tenure who have been selected for the retrenchment process will be notified by October 30th .
- Everyone else has a different notification date which should be announced soon but all professors who are selected will be terminated by the end of the current academic year.
- At this time, no specific departments have been selected yet but the smaller they are, the more likely it is that they will be eliminated.
- With the elimination of those departments will come the deletion of majors/minors that will force students to change their interest of study.
- Class sizes will also increase.
- Integration with other schools will help keep some classes alive, but students’ risk being shipped to another campus just to take a class that they probably will need to graduate.
Retrenchment is going to affect everyone. Just ask one of our students, Kyle Schlecht, who wrote two letters to the editor of “The Express”. One talks about his perspective on the upcoming faculty cuts and the other expresses what they mean for the students. They’re both accessible online at: (“LHU faculty cuts from a student’s perspective”):
https://www.lockhaven.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/2020/09/lhufaculty-cuts-from-a-student-perspective/fbclid=IwAR3fskuPo4SrUksrjRTqbCddGjlsbpsAy3EmARQRe5QMiBdquugtsQIlVeA (“What LHU staff cuts mean for you”):
https://www.lockhaven.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/2020/09/what-lhu-staffcutsmeanforyou/fbclid=IwAR3iPaicavSrvKIvso_Y0oTGrPYrjGgJ4UHhZ5QJQgrIR88Ap45y5lfhMBQ.
I highly recommend a quick read as it may help you understand what’s to come a little bit better. No matter the outcome of the retrenchment, every student should have each other’s back because this will affect everyone and we need to pick other back up when the dust settles.
