Shaky Future For Chicago University

(Compiled from press and news reports)

CHICAGO
Chicago State University asked employees and students to turn in their keys to campus buildings and offices by Monday, April 4, according to the Chicago Tribune. Despite a student and faculty protest in February, the state’s eight-month budget crisis continues. And the university, which has a predominantly minority and low-income student body, has not received state funding since July 1.

“We have enough cash to make payroll through April 30, and then the operating dollars are no longer sufficient,” a university spokesman, Thomas Wogan, told the Tribune. The request for keys is among the steps necessary to prepare for layoffs, he said. He declined to explain how employees would get into their offices, classrooms, or laboratories after Monday.
In February, thousands of Chicago State University students were forced to change their spring break plans because of lack of state funding.

School officials said they were accelerating the semester and cancelling spring break, which was scheduled for March 14-19, due to the Illinois state budget impasse. Graduation has also been moved up to April 28 from May 12. With no end to the budget impasse in sight, CSU President Thomas Calhoun says the 140-year-old school is trying to come up with ways to save money for the following school year. Officials also said CSU could be forced to lay off a significant number of employees.