President’s Newsletter

Friday, November 1, 2024

Dear Colleagues,

This week was a busy one in relation to SUNY meetings. Gary Morog, Julie Caswell, Mike Baird and I met with State University Construction Fund (SUCF) personnel to review our annual “work plan” for facilities projects and to look at projections for five years out. We get a portion of the SUNY $550M capital fund based on a formula that calculates total gross square footage, the percentage of our buildings over 40 years old, and total student FTEs from the previous year. This means in theory, we may receive more funding next year given our two strong years of recruitment. Our five year plan includes over $321M in projects, but our allocation over that same time frame is around $97M. This means we often have to prioritize and re-prioritize projects, especially as costs rise. Additional capital funding is likely to be part of SUNY’s budget advocacy over the next year.

I also traveled to Albany for a SUNY Presidents’ Meeting. In addition to presentations from the Chancellor and his senior leadership team, we heard directly from Blake Washington, Director of the NYS Division of the Budget. During the meeting, we discussed a range of topics from FAFSA, to seamless transfer, to new gen ed proposals. The Chancellor announced new SUNY Accessibility Advocates and Allies Program which will be launched early in the new year, and the SUNY CDO announced a new SUNY Institute for DEI Professionals. We then undertook a tabletop exercise on Office of Civil Rights (OCR) complaints. In sector breakouts, we talked about fiscal sustainability, marketing needs and the transfer task force recommendations.

This afternoon I will take part in a SUNY Future of Healthcare Workforce Task Force meeting as we continue to review what sorts of investments are needed across SUNY schools to meet healthcare needs and challenges.

Internally, I was able to meet with the Senate Presidents this week, and had a number of cabinet and senior leader one-to-one meetings. Senate and JPBC both met this week as well. I also met with Amy Guptil to discuss the progress that the Transportation Task Force is making. At our Cabinet meeting, we had a presentation from our new BASC executive director Bill McNamara and a presentation on undergraduate retention rates.

Unbelievably, November is here! I look forward to seeing you at First Friday at the Alumni House this afternoon.