The University of Maine System board of trustees has finalized the elimination of three programs at the University of Southern Maine. The action was taken today at the system's board meeting, which had been moved from USM to the Fort Kent campus in far northern Maine, amid criticism from USM students and faculty.
The three programs to be cut include New England and American studies, geosciences, and the arts and humanities program at the Lewiston-Auburn campus. The cuts have generated ongoing campus protests since they were first proposed in June.
The cuts are part of a system-wide effort to close a $69 million budget shortfall by fiscal year 2019, and to slash about $14 million of that from USM's budget this year.
Administrators blame the budget shortfall on flat state funding, frozen tuition rates and declining enrollments.
