St. Cloud State University (SCSU) has shared its plan to update the campus budget, including cutting staff and proposed reductions for degrees, majors and minors, and concentrations and certificates with low enrollment.

School officials say the plan would include a reduction of around 37 employees by the fiscal year 2024. SCSU is still building its budget and hopes to reposition the school for a better future with “significant” course correction in the future budget.

In a press release, the school attributed the cuts to a budget deficit and said their budget deficit is due to several factors, including a “significant demographic decline in the number of graduating high school seniors over the past decade,” increased expenses due to inflation, decreases in state and federal funding, and high instructional costs. The school also noted that COVID-19 also impacted enrollment started in the fall of 2020.

SCSU said their current instructional costs are higher than tuition revenues.

According to the university, 75% of its undergraduate student body is enrolled in just 35 of its 157 programs. Similarly, at the graduate level, 75% of students make up 24 of the school’s 80 programs.

Students enrolled in programs that SCSU chooses to cut will have the chance to complete their program, although new students would not be accepted, according to the university. SCSU has not yet said which programs could be cut under the proposal.

“We sincerely appreciate the contributions of all members of our SCSU community,” Dr. Robbyn Wacker, the president of SCSU, said in a statement. “Making reductions in the number of employees is always a difficult decision, but we must do this work as we build a budget for fiscal year 2024.”