The Board of Trustees met on Nov. 11 to discuss various topics, one of which was the university’s goal for a breakeven budget.

Vice President of Business Affairs Tammy McHale, who attended the meeting, confirmed that Marywood is “budgeting for a deficit” at the end of this fiscal year.

“We’re still in a deficit but we’re moving forward in a positive direction,” McHale said.
President Sr. Mary Persico, IHM, Ed.D., who also attended the meeting, said the university is “making progress with [the deficit.]”

“If we keep moving in this direction, we should be able to break even next [fiscal] year,” Persico said.

According to McHale, the university has a budgeted deficit of $1.4 million for July 2018.

McHale explained that the university exceeded its performance benchmarks for the endowment. She also said that the university’s change in net assets was $289,000 as of June 30, 2017.

Chair of the Board of Trustees Lisa Lori, Esq., said there were no surprises or changes to the university’s budget.

“We are pretty much where we expected to be,” Lori said.

Persico explained that there was less discussion of finance in this meeting than in last year’s meetings.

“The board used to spend the entire meeting focusing on finances, but during this meeting everything fell into a specific time slot and there was more room to discuss other topics such as academics,” explained Persico.

The meeting also included new Board of Trustees members.

Rev. John M. Lapera, a new Marywood Trustee, described the Saturday meeting as “very productive” with “positive energy.”

“I’m excited to be here,” Lapera said.

The board also discussed the follow-up Middle States report. Provost Dr. Susan Turell discussed with the board a set of goals, known as a dashboard, that were to be completed for the report on Dec. 1.

“We discussed working on the report and clarifying the dashboard. It seems that we should be on target to reach those goals,” Turell said.

Contact the writer: [email protected]
[email protected]
Twitter: @JBonacciTWW