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LOCK HAVEN -- Nearly two dozen faculty at Lock Haven University could face retrenchment by the end of the 2023-2024 academic year.
Lock Haven University and the Association of Pennsylvania State College and University Faculty (APSCUF) officials confirmed that 23 letters of intent to retrench were issued to faculty on Oct. 21. Three letters were also sent to faculty at Mansfield University.
An agreement between APSCUF and PASSHE required the state system to notify tenured faculty members of intent to retrench by Oct. 30. According to a release from the union, no other letters are expected to be received.
The Oct. 30 deadline is the first in a series for alerting faculty members they could be retrenched.
The APSCUF contract requires probationary non-tenured faculty members beyond the second year to be sent letters by certified mail or hand delivery on or before Dec. 1; second-year probationary non-tenured faculty members, on or before Dec. 15; and first-year probationary non-tenured faculty members, on or before March 1.
Typically, letters of intent such as these would go into effect by the end of the academic year they are issued. However, according to a press release issued by APSCUF, due to a side-letter agreement between the union and PASSHE, the timeline was changed.
"Every letter is traumatic for the faculty member who receives it -- and for their colleagues and students," APSCUF President Dr. Jamie Martin said. "We are not yet out of the pandemic, and these faculty members are now grappling with the possibility of unemployment during a precarious and troubling time. I am heartbroken for my colleagues who are already dealing with the uncertainty of consolidation -- and for their students who face loss of opportunities as well."
Both Martin and LHU's Executive Director of Strategic Communications, Liz Arnold, said these letters of intent do not mean faculty members will be out of a job.
"LHU is exhausting every opportunity to avoid them becoming actual retrenchment. We are looking to provide permanent work within the university, triad or at other PASSHE institutions," Arnold said.
The university is also working with union members as well, Arnold added.
"While we work to find alternatives to layoffs, our faculty members continue to do the important, valuable jobs they were hired to do," Martin said. "The consolidation of Bloomsburg, Lock Haven and Mansfield will not occur by flipping a switch, and, as the chancellor mentioned in this week's Act 50 Senate hearing, there is still much work to be done -- and our faculty will be doing much of the heavy lifting. There will still be students to teach at Lock Haven and Mansfield, and the consolidation work cannot progress without the efforts and expertise of our faculty."
These letters come just months after the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education Board of Directors voted to merge both universities with Bloomsburg University. The intergration is expect to begin at the start of the 2022-2023 academic year.
Discussion regarding the reduction of staff throughout the PASSHE system, including at LHU, has been in discussion since 2020 when PASSHE Chancellor Daniel Greenstein requested universities return their student/faculty ratios to that of 2010-2011. The number of faculty that may face retrenchment intially stood at about 100. But, following disucssion between APSCUF and the state system, it was reduced to 31.