UWSP will hear new bid on humanities cuts
300 people protested plan to cut 13 majors
STEVENS POINT – A University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point spokeswoman said Wednesday that university leaders have tasked a committee to create a new proposal aimed at limiting cuts to humanities majors.
The action by the university’s common council comes after roughly 300 people on March 21 staged a sit-in of the Old Main building to protest a proposal by the university that would cut 13 humanities majors.
The proposal has been met with backlash and has garnered national attention.
At the student-led protest, students delivered to the chancellor and the administration a letter asking the university to create a second proposal.
“In response to a request from students and alumni who organized a sitin on campus March 21, the UW-Stevens Point Common Council has asked its Academic Affairs Committee to serve as a task force to write a counterproposal for addressing fiscal challenges, one that particularly preserves our existing humanities majors,” said Nick Schultz, a UW-Stevens Point spokesperson, in an email Wednesday evening.
Schultz added that the committee aims to produce a second proposal by May.
The university continues to face backlash after it released a proposal that would eliminate 13 majors and add or expand degrees in 16 technical or STEM fields, which university administrators say are more popular and therefore more likely to attract students and more revenue. The proposal comes after years of enrollment declines and budget tightening and is the university’s response to a $4.5 million deficit. The university’s current proposal would also help stabilize enrollment, officials said.
Gigi Stahl, a senior English major and an organizer of last week’s protest, said to USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin last week that the students wanted to work with the university’s administration in crafting the new proposal.
“We want to be able to push this forward,” she said.
Any formal action taken by the campus governance system and the University of Wisconsin Board of Regents on proposals would come no sooner than Aug. 1.