Office of the Dean
Dear colleagues,
I hope you are well as we approach the end of our fall semester, and I hope you have a wonderful winter break. As part of our ongoing efforts to enhance our fiscal stewardship, I am writing to share with you an important change to our FY26 budget planning process.
In consultation with the college’s Fiscal Transformation Committee, we are making changes to enhance and bring greater transparency to our FY26 planning process and ensure broad engagement from you in projecting spending needs for the upcoming fiscal year. Your engagement is crucial to ensuring that our budget accurately reflects our academic and administrative needs.
As in previous years, the budget planning process will be led by the university’s Office of Budget and Finance in collaboration with our college’s fiscal team, department chairs and directors.
Beginning this month and extending through the end of January, our finance officers will work closely with department/office leaders to project the budget needs for FY26. Collaboratively, they will gather input from you to identify academic and administrative priorities and related costs. This important task
will inform the overall FY26 college budget to ensure it reflects and aligns with the strategic priorities of each department and unit.
This planning process will be used to determine spending needs across all funding sources, including:
- General Funds: Professional development allocations, faculty startup, department operating and instructional funds, residuals and indirect cost recoveries (IDCs)
- Grant Funds: Internal and external seed grants, current state and federal awards and contracts
- Gift Funds: Current use gifts and endowments
- Earnings Funds: Earnings and conference funds
- Plant Funds: Facility and renovation funds
- Agency Funds: External funds housed at the university
With your direct engagement, we will determine how our resources are allocated to effectively advance the mission of our college.
Be well,
Don Pope-Davis, PhD
Dean
