Monday, August 11, 2025

Message from the President

Dear Colleagues, 

Welcome to the Fall 2025 semester! Our newest Privateers are participating in Mambo this week and I am thrilled to experience the hustle and bustle of helping students to get moved in, situated and welcomed - our students are the "why" behind so much of what we do at the University of New Orleans and it is terrific to welcome them back this week as we prepare for classes to start next Monday.

I would like to offer a few updates and two messages of thanks. I will also admit that in my role it is impossible to over-communicate and I have struggled with sharing information in writing while working at breakneck speed. I will keep trying - but I would also ask that you feel free to pull me into meeting or convenings this fall as it is always a pleasure to be able to meet in person and engage in dialogue with colleagues. First the updates:

1) Financially, we have achieved a once-in-a-generation (or lifetime?) reset. Our debts are paid off (except for long term contracts, which we will manage), and our budget has been realigned to reflect the revenues we received last year. Funds for fixed expenses (e.g., utilities) and planned maintenance of our facilities have been hard-wired into the budget and we have several crews of outstanding students that have tackled a lot of neglected maintenance over the summer, including landscaping and pressure washing. They have quite simply been amazing - and have also brought tremendous energy and joy to the Administration Building.

2) We continue to await guidance from the Transition Team on our move back to the LSU system. Several colleagues from the LSU administration and LSU Board of Supervisors will be visiting the University of New Orleans on August 22 to discuss the transition process and begin to organize the work that must be done between now and March, 2026 - which is when our substantive change proposal is due to SACSCOC.

3) Enrollments are not where we had hoped, but a veritable army of dedicated staff and faculty have been helping to enroll and support every student that we can. We are grateful to the UNO Foundation for providing additional scholarship funds that we have been using to help continuing students to enroll. We have built contingencies into our budget so that we can adjust expenditures throughout the year to remain aligned with our $85.5M budget.

And the thanks:

First, I am grateful to the legions of staff and faculty that have come together to much more holistically support student enrollment and success, including our advising professionals, our student affairs staff, and so many others from the graduate office, the financial aid, registrar, and bursar offices, Chartwell's, Information Technology, admissions, marketing, athletics, and the foundation. It takes a village to support student success, and our village has been remarkably active, positive, and supportive all summer long. I also am so thankful for faculty and staff that have stepped up to teach UNIV 1001 (University Success) courses this fall. This course is both fun to teach and a great way of more deeply understanding and appreciating the needs and strengths of our newest students.

Second, I want to thank our faculty for the care and nurturing they provide to our students in the classroom as well as in the studio, laboratory, and field. I very much appreciate their willingness to teach one extra class per semester in some cases - only for this year - which is helping to ensure that we are delivering our curricula efficiently. It also helps to ensure that our beginning students have the opportunity to be inspired by outstanding faculty that are able to share their research and creative activity as they teach. Such inspiration during my freshman year at the University of Massachusetts literally changed my life. My hope is that every student at the University of New Orleans will have at least one experience like this along their academic journey.

With UNO Pride,

Kathy Johnson, Ph.D.
President
The University of New Orleans