Similarly, the 10 programs being cut at Vermont State University include applied business, computer engineering technology, climate change science, and school psychology. Cuts at Marymount University include mathematics, economics, and secondary education, among others. At the University of Maine, Farmington—the University of Maine system’s public liberal arts college—philosophy and religion, history, world languages, and women’s and gender studies are all being slashed.
In many cases, the programs being cut actually operate at a net profit for the university. WVU is cutting programs in Russian, Chinese, Spanish, French, and German studies, though budget records show that the World Languages, Literatures, and Linguistics Department nets at least $800,000 per year. Though it may seem counterintuitive, departments of English, math, history, and world languages typically make money for colleges and universities, as they serve a high number of students through general education courses—even with declining numbers of majors—and have relatively low overhead compared with departments where research and teaching require expensive equipment, or in which faculty are paid higher salaries (think business schools, economics, and medical science).
When you put it all together, the claim that slashing academic programs is necessary for sound fiscal management looks dubious at best. What’s actually happening is that ideologically motivated higher education leadership have been using the pretext of financial exigency to reengineer higher education. But the ideology isn’t necessarily liberal or conservative; it’s the short-term thinking of business management.