UW Whitewater Announces Furloughs

UW Whitewater announced Friday that furloughs will be how they deal with the financial hardships of the COVID 19 crisis. The university has already been making substantial budget cuts due to lower enrollment but have lost nearly 9 million dollars in expenses and loss of revenue because of the pandemic. Layoffs have not been ruled out as an option but will only use that as a last resort. Furloughs are unpaid leave but it allows employees to keep benefits such as health insurance, vacation and sick leave accrual, it also preserves the employees job so they can return in the future. The university has to prepare for reductions in income from areas like tuition, housing and dining, some of the steps they might take to limit spending is pausing hiring except for essential workers, suspending non mandated salary increases and eliminating purchases or expenditures through June 30th. The commencement has bee postponed, undergraduates have until May 27th to switch to satisfactory no credit for courses, summer courses will be moved to online and decisions about classes for next semester will come later. Details on furloughs at both campuses will be released next week.