Degrees of separation

IOWA CITY - The 10 smallest degree programs at Iowa's public universities often have less than a dozen undergraduates majoring in that subject, but size doesn't necessarily matter when it comes to considering program cuts.

The smallest programs at the University of Northern Iowa range from one to six student majors. At the University of Iowa, the 10 smallest range from one to 18 majors. And at Iowa State University, the 10 smallest programs have six to 42 majors. The numbers were provided by the provost offices; UNI's numbers are from fall 2010, and the UI's and ISU's are from this fall.

Officials say academic programs with a small number of majors are seldom stand-alone programs; they use faculty or classes from larger programs and are designed to be interdisciplinary. And it's not unusual for programs to have small numbers of majors but still attract large enrollments to introductory classes.

Still, the universities have eliminated, merged or restructured 40 academic programs since 2008 as they deal with state budget cuts and limited resources.

Low demand is one factor, but not the only reason, a program may face the ax, university officials said. Some programs become obsolete or the direction of the field changes.

ISU in 2004 looked at every program with less than 50 undergraduate majors. Of the 14 on that list, seven were eliminated, said Dave Holger, associate provost for academic programs. ISU uses incentive budgeting, so departments with more students get more funding, which encourages colleges to keep an eye on small programs, he said.

“The last five years, times have been tough,” Holger said. “People can't afford to keep majors that cost a lot of money and don't impact lots of students.”

Universities around the country are looking at cuts in the face of dwindling state funding. The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board - similar to Iowa's state Board of Regents - in October voted to phase out 64 degree programs that failed to attract enough majors, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported.

In Iowa, UNI especially is facing hard choices given its heavy reliance on state funding and in-state student enrollment, President Ben Allen said. The university will look at academic and non-academic program cuts as officials search for ways to stabilize the budget, he said.

Regent Bob Downer of Iowa City said he's long been a proponent of looking for similarities among smaller programs at the universities to consider ways they can share courses and programs through online education. Maryland's university system, for example, requires students to take a set number of online credits from another campus in the system, Downer said.

“I feel strongly that this is something we need to do, and I think it's possible that we could enhance quality and efficiency at the same time,” he said.

A lot of the monitoring of programs happens at the college level, where budgetary control is, said Beth Ingram, UI associate provost for undergraduate education.

The more important issue for UI officials is watching very small class sizes, rather than majors, she said, because that's where the financial impact is found.

Some foreign languages, for example, have few majors but will get large class enrollments because of language requirements, Ingram said.

Factors other than size to consider when evaluating programs include the research and outreach missions of the department and graduate programs, officials said.

The new Division of World Languages, Literatures and Cultures at the UI, launched last fall, brings language programs and departments under one division. The small size of many of the programs and finding efficiencies were factors, but officials mainly hope it will lead to more collaboration and developing research initiatives or team-taught courses, division Director Russ Ganim said.

“We're looking for common interests, where we can share our intellectual expertise and innovate,” he said. “Without question, we definitely want to increase our numbers.”

Astronomy is listed as having 16 undergrad majors this fall at the UI, but including second majors bumps it to 41, physics and astronomy Chairwoman Mary Hall Reno said. It requires only two more courses in astronomy to add a double major to physics, she said.

Astronomy also is an example of a subject with a small number of majors but in high demand among other students, with 600 non-majors enrolled in introductory courses this fall, Associate Professor Cornelia Lang said.

“Those are very popular courses,” she said.