The school year has now drawn to a close, to be followed shortly by the end of the present financial year. The importance of funding of our academic and research programs has never been more acute. This is a trying time given all the uncertainties associated with state funding. Yet again, as for many states, Maryland appears to regard higher education as a luxury item to be supported when times are good and cut back when times are bad, rather than as a vital economic and educational investment for the future. We are expecting that the department’s state funding will be reduced by somewhere over 10% compared with our FY2003 budget. This represents an enormous reduction and will substantially affect our abilities to offer the full range of classes available in previous years. It will also negatively affect all other aspects of the department’s work including maintaining and improving our computer laboratories, and in supporting our graduate students and faculty in their scholarly activities.

Our departmental dependence on the state is in fact relatively small, only just over 21%, but those state dollars are vital to our existence. Our grant earning capabilities remain at a very high rate of over $5 million for the fourth year running and we will top $6 million for the current financial year. It is worth noting that almost all of this money stays here at Maryland. These are not pass through funds (not that there's anything wrong with that), nor are they dominated by any very large grants. Rather they represent the cumulative efforts of virtually all faculty in competitively winning research dollars; our average per capita earnings of faculty member now exceeds $400,000.

However, although our external grants are very substantial, there is no simple (or at least legal way) that we can substitute grant monies for state monies and we need the latter to underpin everything we do, especially our academic programs. Hence, we must also seek to find more ways to reduce our dependency on state funds. One of the ways to do the latter comes from giving. I feel sure that all our readers will welcome the news that two anonymous donors associated with the department have recently told me that they are bequeathing the department $100,000. These are not wealthy people, but people who recognize that they can in the future make a very important contribution to the department and are taking concrete plans to do so.

The end of every year leads to changes in responsibilities within the department. An especially important one this year is that Martha Geores is stepping down as our Graduate Director. Martha has performed a terrific job in this position for the last four years and the department owes her an enormous debt of gratitude for all her efforts. She is replaced by Eric Kasischke, who took over on June 1. Currently, he is being bitten alive while doing field work in Alaska, but is keeping in contact by e-mail.