Nipissing University approves 2015-16 budget

Nipissing University’s Board of Governors approved the 2015-16 budget at their regular meeting on June 4.

The university is projecting revenues of $67,566,128 and expenses of $72,849,343, resulting in a projected deficit of $5,283,215.  

The 2015-16 budget represents a significantly smaller projected deficit than the projected $11.8 million deficit from the 2014-15 fiscal year, and includes key investments in student recruitment and new faculty positions for Nursing, Business and Criminal Justice.

The budget presentation also included a recovery plan to address the deficit and return the university to financial health. Key highlights of the recovery plan include increasing revenue through recruitment and retention of students, growing international recruitment, expanding academic programs, increasing research revenue, and working with officials at the Ministry of Colleges Training and Universities to examine the funding mechanisms that are in place.

“The budget includes key investments in new faculty positions, financial aid and recruitment to ensure academic quality, support and growth,” said Dr. Harley d’Entremont, provost and vice-president academic and research. “There were some tough decisions that had to be made to reduce this budget compared to last year.  Over the next year, we will continue to work to minimize the deficit through fiscal responsibility and striving for efficiencies.”

“The road ahead looks good for Nipissing University. Our recovery plan focuses primarily on ways to increase revenue and some of those ideas are already in action.  A number of new programs are on the way, including the Bachelor of Social Work, a Master of Science in Kinesiology, and a Master of Sociology.  We also believe we can do more in international recruitment, with the potential to slowly rise enrolment from 50 to around 500 international students over the course of a few years,” added d’Entremont.

The university is implementing a three per cent tuition rate increase as per the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities guidelines to continue providing the quality academic resources and financial aid for students.