Marquette and the Financial Crisis

An e-mail, forwarded to all faculty, from Provost John Pauly:

From: Pauly, John
Sent: Friday, November 14, 2008 4:43 PM
To: [Department Chairs]
Subject: Finance office website

Hi, folks,

Linda Salchenberger said that some of her faculty have been asking questions about Marquette’s financial situation in relation to the current economic downturn, and have asked whether Father Wild planned to issue a letter addressing the problem. I suspect that some of you may be fielding similar questions.

So far Father Wild has resisted writing a note as other universities have because Marquette is not anticipating any layoffs, cutbacks, closings, or freezes. The situation is serious but not dire, and so far seems manageable. Indeed, we hope to propose a modest tuition increase, offer at least some salary increase for faculty and staff, and even finance one or two new academic initiatives.

The finance office has put together an information page on Marquette’s response to the current turmoil, which it regularly updates. Here is the link to that page:

http://www.marquette.edu/financeoffice/

Please feel free to share this link with any of your faculty and staff.

Have a good weekend!

John Pauly

Provost

The relevant document from the Finance Office website can be found here.

Clearly, the Administration is trying to calm people down a bit. We have no reason to doubt the assertions in the Finance Office document. It claims that Marquette operating funds are invested conservatively and that Marquette remains able to borrow money when needed. It doesn’t address, and indeed appears to evade, describing what has happened to Marquette’s endowment funds.

We’ll report further when we learn more.