Many smaller, private colleges and universities are facing financial challenges. The University of Lynchburg is now offering voluntary buyouts to faculty as it works to recover from a large deficit.
But some academics say those faculty members should have had a say in how this process was launched.
The buyouts were first offered to tenured and tenure-track faculty November 6th, as the university has worked to recover from a deficit that was high as $12 million in 2022.
That deficit was trimmed to roughly $2.6 million in the last fiscal year, and the budget is now balanced. Vice President and Chief of Staff to the President’s office Daniel Hall said the buyouts are one part of an overall plan to control costs.
"This is one piece of a broader strategy," he explains. "There are a couple dozen tactics and strategies we're putting in place - both on the revenue generation side, as well as the expense management side, and none of them are being looked at in isolation."
Hall said no academic programs will be eliminated through the buyouts, and there's not a target figure for how many faculty members accept the offer.
Tim Gibson is President of the Virginia Conference of the American Association of University Professors. He said such a move is reasonable, but adds faculty should have been consulted first.
“If you’re ignoring them, if you’re not including faculty voices in these kinds of decisions, the decisions themselves are going to have unintended consequences, or negative consequences that faculty could have prevented if they were part of this conservation," he said.
Gibson said he's afraid that too many experienced, higher-paid faculty with long tenure will accept buyouts, meaning the University of Lynchburg may no longer offer a full range of faculty experience.
Hall said the plans to boost revenue include a new undergraduate program in criminal forensics, and athletics is launching a wrestling program in the fall of 2026. The university has also revamped how it reaches out to prospective students.
The university is also searching for a new president. Alison Morrison-Shetlar has announced she's retiring in June of 2026, with the university hoping to name a replacement by next spring.
