Advocate for Rutgers, Preserve Excellence

June 12, 2006

Members of the Rutgers Community:

Final decisions about the state budget will be made in the next couple of weeks.  Please take a few moments now to advocate for Rutgers with our leaders in Trenton.  Even if you have called or written before, this is a special and urgent request to contact the leadership in both houses of the Legislature as well as Governor Corzine.  These are the elected officials who will have primary responsibility for the final decisions on the state budget.

Let me tell you what is at stake by reminding you of what Rutgers does–and does very well. 

Rutgers provides a superb education to more than 50,000 students, preparing them to succeed in a highly sophisticated economy and contribute to the civic life of our state and nation. Our staff is outstanding, and our faculty includes some of the finest scholars and researchers in the nation. They are widely known and celebrated for their work in areas such as combating AIDS, improving early childhood education, strengthening homeland security, and addressing transportation needs. 

Our university boasts academic disciplines that rank at or near the top nationally.  Our interdisciplinary strengths enable Rutgers to provide leadership in 21st-century fields such as nanotechnology and stem cell research.  Our students, among the most diverse at any institution in America, earn prestigious scholarships and awards for their achievements in and outside the classroom.  And every day our alumni prove the value of a Rutgers degree by their accomplishments in practically every field of human endeavor.

Even with a partial restoration of state funding, Rutgers will need to make very difficult choices, which it is our obligation to do as the state confronts its long-term structural budget problems.  But the current proposal, which hits higher education especially hard, would create unprecedented hardships for Rutgers and especially for our present and future students.  Tuition would rise significantly, many Rutgers employees would be laid off, and large numbers of courses and sections would be cancelled.

State funding is essential to maintaining the excellent programs through which Rutgers serves its students and the people of New Jersey.  If you believe, as I do, that higher education is fundamental to the economic, social, and civic well-being of our state, you will join me in asking the Legislature and the Governor to do all they can to restore funding to the state's colleges and universities. 

Thank you for your support of Rutgers.  Please know that your efforts are appreciated greatly.

Richard L. McCormick
President
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey