CLEMSON — Clemson University officials announced Thursday plans for dealing with the school’s multi-million-dollar cut in state funding, which includes a tuition increase and position cuts.

University president Jim Barker called the strategy “a responsible, strategic plan that protects academic quality and minimizes impact on students.”

“This plan manages funding reductions, protects quality and includes a reasonable and affordable tuition proposal,” he said.

“It is a plan that is responsible to the state, to families who trust us with their future and mostly to students who come to Clemson with high expectations,” Barker said. “We need to deliver.

The university is facing a total funding loss of $5.7 million, and as a result plan to cut $30 million from the internal budget, including the elimination of more than 450 positions and consolidation of some departments, Baker said.

The state budget for 2009-2010 cuts Clemson’s appropriation by $40.7 million. Education and General (E&G) programs were cut by $26.8 million and Public Service Activities (PSA) by $13.9 million. Another $5 million cut came in private support from the Clemson University Foundation.

Students will also have to pay more to attend classes.

In state students will face a 4.5 percent increase in tuition, and out-of-state student fees will go up by 7.5 percent.

The increase will offset about one third of them state funding that was cut, according to university officials.



“Clemson faces a loss of at least $45 million in revenue next year,” said university board chairman Bill Hendrix.

“We will cover two-thirds of that — about $30 million — through aggressive and sometimes painful internal budget cuts and reallocations,” he said.



“Without this cost-cutting and the use of federal stimulus funds, we would have needed a tuition increase of 26 percent to cover the shortfall,” Hendrix said.

He called the tuition increases “reasonable.”

University officials also plan to use a portion of its stimulus money to help fund a long-planned renovation of Lee Hall, a classroom and studio building for the architecture and visual arts programs that’s 51 years old.

The tuition increase will add up to $234 per semester for in-state students and $878 per semester for out-of-state students.

University officials also noted that about one third of the positions being eliminated were vacant at the beginning of the fiscal year when they implemented a hiring freeze.

Many other positions are temporary and contract positions, or are filled by people who plan to retire, they said.

“A budget cut of this magnitude could not be managed without losing positions,” Baker said. “The hiring freeze and voluntary retirement-incentive programs minimized the negative impact on individuals.”