The Board of Regents, at its July meeting, is expected to approve several program eliminations recommended by NIU.

The eliminations are an answer to recommendations made by the Illinois Board of Higher Education which would require NIU to cut 15 academic programs, including the College of Law and the doctoral program in psychology.

NIU Provost J. Carroll Moody said NIU has communicated to the IBHE that there are several programs NIU will not cut including the doctoral programs in psychology, geology and special education, the College of Law, the M.A. in French and the performer’s certificate in music. All these programs were recommended by the IBHE for elimination.

Programs recommended by NIU that the Regents are likely to cut or consolidate include M.A.‘s in Russian, German and journalism and education doctorates in business and reading.

Charles Morris, Regents vice chancellor for academic affairs, said the Regents will be looking to approve NIU’s suggested program cuts during their July meeting.

“I think there is a strong possibility that they (the program cuts) will be endorsed by the board,” he said. “They have already been endorsed on the campus level.”

NIU is hoping the program eliminations will be a satisfactory alternative to some of the programs the IBHE has recommended for elimination.

In contrast to the Regents, the IBHE’s plans for NIU’s recommendations are still unknown.

IBHE Deputy Director Ross Hodel said, “Until we have it (NIU’s 1993 Productivity Report) in our hands it would be premature to discuss what actions will be taken.”

However, Moody said he and NIU President John La Tourette have “essentially outlined” NIU’s program recommendations and “discussed what will be NIU’s priority” with IBHE Executive Director Richard Wagner and Executive Deputy Director Robert Wallhaus.

In regard to the meeting, Moody said, “We had a very reasonable and non-adversarial discussion. It was clear there were some differences between what the IBHE wanted us to do and what the university wants to do.”

He said there was no indication of whether the IBHE will accept NIU’s alteration to its suggested programmatic actions. “We didn’t ask for any statement and they didn’t give any statement of whether it will be okay or not.

“I certainly hope they accept it,” Moody added. “One of the things I tried to say to them is that we had reviewed all of the programmatic action on their list (of programs to eliminate). The Academic Planning Council looked at every single program on that list. We explained why we were not willing to accept some of the things on their list.

“We’ll just have to wait and see what happens. I really don’t have a sense of what their response to the report will be,” he said.

Hodel said, “In a sense, it was just a status report and until the report is received officially we (the IBHE) are not making public any opinions or attitudes about them (NIU’s suggested programmatic actions).”

“I think there is a strong possibility that they (the program cuts) will be endorsed by the board,” he said. “They have already been endorsed on the campus level.”

Charles Morris, Regents vice chancellor for academic affairs