Counsel on Program Elimination

This book has provided case illustrations and discussed the costs and savings of program elimination, the role of leadership, the ability of shared governance to make hard decisions, and the use of criteria. The concluding chapter brings together the findings to provide counsel on program elimination. It presents rationale for why decisions must be defensible; discusses the tradeoffs regarding savings, tenure, and program elimination; and makes suggestions both for campus leaders seeking to eliminate programs and for those seeking to fight off program closures. Additionally, it suggests empirically based modifications to the Association of American University Professors (AAUP) policies concerning program termination and shared governance.