Utah's public colleges will soon have to decide which programs and positions to cut, as well as what parts of their curriculum are “high demand” and deserve the saved funds. That’s the directive from lawmakers in their big-ticket higher education bill, HB265, which now goes to Gov. Spencer Cox.
The incentive for college leaders to reallocate the funds is simple – if they don’t, they will lose them. Lawmakers took a collective $60.5 million from the eight degree-granting institutions and moved it into a “strategic reinvestment” fund for the 2026 fiscal year. That number represents 10% of each college’s state-funded instructional budget, which ranges from $1.7 million for Snow College and $19.6 million for the University of Utah. Cox has already signed that budget bill into law.
Colleges can get all of that money back if they follow the instructions outlined in HB265.
As long as the bill is signed into law as expected, the next step lies with the Utah Board of Higher Education. The governing body needs to create guidance for how the schools should evaluate their programs to determine what deserves more funding and which ones deserve less. The state’s commissioner of higher education, Geoffrey Landward, told KUER in January the board will release that as soon as possible.
“We've prioritized making sure that the institutions can put these plans together rapidly and have them approved quickly so that everybody on the campus knows what the plan is going to look like,” he said.
Some of the decisions that have to be made, Landward said, will be painful for schools. But he thinks it would be worse to draw out the process and make people sit in uncertainty about their future.
“The quicker that the institution can have the plan put together, then the more clarity everybody will have, and then we start dealing with the ‘knowns’.”
After that guidance is released, the bill specifies colleges should make decisions based on enrollment data, completion rates and timely completion, professional outcomes, current and future workforce demands, program-level costs and each college’s role within the state’s higher education system.
Working with the board, schools will use that information to create individual “strategic reinvestment plans” that identify what degrees, departments or other areas “merit further investment.” Conversely, they will also list which areas face reduction or elimination to free up money.
After some concern, senators added a line that emphasized the need for the institutions to retain a strong general education curriculum “that enables students to acquire critical thinking, problem-solving, citizenship, communication and other durable skills.”
These plans have to be approved by the board, then the Legislature’s Higher Education Appropriations Subcommittee in August as well as the Executive Appropriations Committee in September.
The bill does allow for a “teach out” period, meaning students currently enrolled in the programs can still graduate. Colleges will have three years to fully implement their plans but can get all of their money back right away if their plans are approved.
Lawmakers stressed this is not a budget cut.
“[The money] will not be cut from the institution if they have thoughtful plans for reinvestment of those funds. That's not the goal of this,” Sen. Ann Millner said during a Feb. 26 floor debate.
The reason for this bill, said the Republican and former president of Weber State University, is the state’s higher education budget has grown at a disproportionate rate to its growth in students. At the same time, college administrative costs have gone up.
“We want to make sure that we're using our funds to the highest and best use,” Millner said.
Democratic Sen. Karen Kwan, an emeritus professor at Salt Lake Community College, unsuccessfully tried to amend the bill to mandate the input of faculty and students. Millner resisted and said she didn’t know a college professor who wouldn’t have campus-wide discussions about the decisions.
Utah’s higher education system is navigating a period of change and uncertainty. Last year’s anti-diversity, equity and inclusion law eliminated some programs, offices and hiring practices. Student centers closed as a result and some student affinity groups also lost funding. In Southern Utah, Utah Tech University has a new president after the last one left campus amid controversy. Professors and researchers at the University of Utah are navigating the Trump administration’s push to cut federal research funding, which is currently being sorted out in court.
Lawmakers also approved a bill aimed at overhauling the general education curriculum at Utah State as a pilot. It awaits Cox’s signature. If the state board of higher education deems the pilot successful, it could be replicated across the state.
