By Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger

NEW BRUNSWICK — The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation will donate $12.5 million to Rutgers University to help cover the cost of its merger with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, campus officials announced today.

The money, which is the largest donation Rutgers has ever received from the foundation, will make a dent in the estimated $76.3 million in uncovered costs for the July 1 merger. Rutgers officials have appealed unsuccessfully to the state to help pay for the integration of the two schools.

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State’s colleges educating 55,000 more students with $303 million less state money than in 2006

By Mark J. Magyar

New Jersey’s higher education institutions are serving many more students with far fewer state dollars, the presidents of New Jersey’s two largest universities told the state Senate Budget Committee yesterday. And unless the state increases its funding for operating expenses, there is no way New Jersey will be able to compete with better-funded university systems in other states when it comes to academic excellence, research and development, and recruiting top students.

But while Rutgers University President Robert Barchi and Montclair State University President Susan Cole, chair of the New Jersey Presidents’ Council, were in agreement on funding, it was Barchi who came under heavy questioning about his plans to fund the university’s merger with UMDNJ in the next month, as well as for his handling of the recent basketball controversy.

Rochelle Hendricks, the secretary of higher education, was also at odds with the panel when she refused to explain why two religious colleges were awarded $10.6 million in capital building grants.

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By Anthony Campisi, State House Bureau, The Record.

Faced with a projected cost of more than $75 million to absorb the state’s public medical and dental school, Rutgers University has no alternative but to curtail programs and defer maintenance, its president, Robert L. Barchi, told lawmakers on Monday.

“We have no additional funds” to pay for Rutgers’ merger with the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, he hold members of the Senate Budget Committee. He did not say which programs and projects the university would be forced to cut.

Governor Christie did not include any money in his proposed budget to cover the costs of the merger, which was mandated as part of a sweeping overhaul of New Jersey’s public higher education system. Christie and a bipartisan group of lawmakers have said the move will boost scientific research at Rutgers and enable it to attract significantly more research dollars.

Barchi said there was no money in Rutgers’ own budget to cover the cost of the merger, which he pegged at $76.3 million over the next 2½ years. The school is on track to complete the merger by the July 1 deadline, he added.

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By Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger

NEWARK — Facing a growing revolt on the Newark campus, Rutgers University President Robert Barchi released never-before-seen numbers today to dispute allegations the school is pouring money into its main New Brunswick campus while shortchanging students on the smaller Newark and Camden campuses.

The new calculations by the university’s budgeting office show Rutgers spends about $13,969 per student each year on instruction on the New Brunswick campus, compared to $12,104 per student at Rutgers-Camden and $11,870 per student at Rutgers-Newark.

“There are small differences between campuses, but nowhere near the magnitude that’s being implied,” Barchi said. “The differences are relatively small.”

Barchi, who is nearing the end of his first school year at Rutgers, outlined the numbers during a wide-ranging meeting with The Star-Ledger’s editorial board in Newark, during which he also discussed the university’s recent basketball scandal, athletic funding and other issues.

Armed with 10 pages of new data, Barchi said he first wanted to clarify numbers being circulated by his critics that show the university spends $15,092 per year on each student in New Brunswick-Piscataway, compared to $8,070 in Newark. Those numbers, drawn from federal data, have raised serious questions from lawmakers in Trenton about how the state university is spending its money.

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By Patricia Alex, Staff Writer, The Record.

The projected cost for the state’s massive higher education reorganization has grown to more than $100 million, according to officials from the public universities involved — a burden that many fear will be shifted, despite assurances from school leaders, onto those who pay tuition.

No funding for the merger plan has been included in the state budget, leaving it to the schools — Rutgers University, the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and Rowan University — to absorb the one-time expenses.

“If we’re not paying for this, who is?” asked John Connelly, a senior at Rutgers who is soon to graduate with $20,000 in student loan debt. “Tuition is very much treated as a renewable resource that can be increased.”

School leaders say that won’t happen. But concern over costs at Rutgers, one of the most expensive state universities in the country, is real. And it is just one of the issues confronting Rutgers as it seeks to move on following a month of turmoil that included the firing of its men’s basketball coach and the resignations of its athletic director and chief counsel, and raised questions about the leadership of university President Robert Barchi.

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Distractions aside — and the Rutgers-New Brunswick athletic department is admittedly one big distraction — the limited Rutgers/Rowan/UMDNJ merger is on target for July 1.

Locally, we’ve been paying more attention to a multi-county, shared-services jail “merger” that seems to have become something less. Recall that the state higher education restructuring was whittled down, too, and started out as a plan where Rowan University in Glassboro would “eat” Rutgers’ Camden campus, including its prestigious law school.

A lot of complaining, followed by a lot of compromise, turned the proposal into a workable blueprint whereby the two universities will stay separate but collaborate on their considerable joint interests in health education.

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By Angela Delli Santi, Associated Press.

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) — New Jersey’s governor and Rutgers University’s president believe a higher education merger can be completed on time, though nearly 2,000 items are still on the to-do list as the July 1 deadline approaches.

Gov. Chris Christie said he’s confident Rutgers President Robert Barchi can complete the deal, which breaks up the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and gives most of it, including a coveted medical school, to Rutgers. The deal also links Rutgers-Camden with Rowan University for new academic collaborations but does not merge the two South Jersey schools.

Christie pushed for the deal, and Barchi was brought on board to make it happen after a law was signed last year to allow the restructuring. The president has been sidetracked lately, however, by a basketball coaching scandal that cost several university officials their jobs after ESPN aired video showing ex-coach Mike Rice verbally and physically abusing players.

“This is an important thing to me as you all know, so I’m going to make sure everything that needs to get done from the state’s perspective is done … because I think it will make Rutgers a significantly better institution,” Christie said Friday of the merger.

Barchi told an Assembly budget panel last week he sees “a clear line of sight” to the deadline and guaranteed it would be met.

It was evident from his testimony, however, that significant obstacles remain.

For one, he said, more than half of the 4,000-plus issues associated with the merger had been dealt with, which means some number approaching 2,000 remain unresolved.

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Democratic budget chair criticizes lack of budget detail, while faculty question Barchi’s intentions for Rutgers’ future

By Mark J. Magyar

Embattled Rutgers University President Robert Barchi yesterday not only had to defend his controversial handling of basketball coach Mike Rice’s firing, but also the pending merger of Rutgers and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and his vision for the future of Rutgers’ three campuses.

Barchi, who was chosen last spring as Rutgers’ new president principally because of his record building Philadelphia’s Thomas Jefferson University into a medical research and development powerhouse, told the Assembly Budget Committee that the Rutgers-UMDNJ merger remains on track, despite the controversy swirling around the basketball program and calls for Barchi’s firing by some faculty members.

Gov. Chris Christie has steadfastly defended Barchi during the firestorm of criticism over his handling of the Rice firing. But ultimately it is likely to be how successful Barchi is in reorganizing Rutgers that will decide his fate, as well as the future of the institutions he has been entrusted to lead.

Barchi’s straight-ahead leadership style since coming to Rutgers in October — a trait he shares with Christie — and his recent declaration at a Rutgers-Newark public meeting that he envisions the New Brunswick-Piscataway campus as the “research” flagship, with Newark and Camden serving less prestigious roles as “diversity” and “social service” campuses, has the fiercely independent faculty up in arms.

Meanwhile, Assembly Budget Committee Chairman Vincent Prieto (D-Hudson) yesterday pronounced himself profoundly dissatisfied with various “unanswered questions” and a lack of detail on how Barchi plans to implement the massive merger of New Jersey’s two large public research universities by July 1.

“This reorganization plan is a great opportunity for our state, but it almost seems like it’s being slapped together by the Christie administration without much thought or planning. That was definitely not the Legislature’s expectation,” Prieto said.

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By Jarrett Renshaw/The Star-Ledger

Facing pressure from Gov. Chris Christie and the other political powers in the state, a divided Legislature approved a higher education reorganization plan last summer without knowing how much it would cost and who would pay the bill.

Months later, the governor has still not set aside any money in his latest budget to pay for it.

The Assembly Budget Committee will try to crack the code today when it hears from Robert Barchi, Rutgers University’s new president, and Rochelle Hendricks, the state secretary of higher education.

“Does Rutgers have the money to effectuate a complex reorganization?” asked Assemblyman Albert Coutinho (D-Essex), a member of the Budget Committee. “The answer, apparently, is no.”

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By Stephanie Akin, Staff Writer. The Record.

As Rutgers University works to move beyond the basketball scandal that has dominated headlines the past two weeks, it finds itself on the precipice of a historic change — a merger with the state’s medical school — that has suddenly become more complicated because of the controversy.

The addition of the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey to Rutgers and a looming July 1 deadline to begin the changeover has been cited by Governor Christie as a reason to keep university President Robert L. Barchi in place, even as those under him — from the head coach to the athletic director to the general counsel — have lost their jobs as the scandal has unfolded.

Christie, who has pushed for the merger and is expected to tout it on the campaign trail as he vies for a second term, has stood behind Barchi and the team assembled to complete the merger.

“It’s a huge undertaking, and I have absolute confidence in Bob Barchi, and I believe one of the reasons the board of governors hired him in the first place was to appropriately and effectively manage this merger and the institution that will exist thereafter,” the governor said last week.

A look at what has to be done over the next 10 weeks shows mostly logistical challenges that nevertheless will be cumulatively daunting — as many as 4,600 tasks from transferring contracts to making sure key cards work to changing the printing on the letterhead. The university is also working on its impending move to the Big Ten athletic conference, a change that could bring in millions in revenue and increase exposure.

But larger questions, including how Rutgers will come up with the millions needed to finance the deal, how the university can absorb close to $500 million in UMDNJ debt, and what will happen to redundant faculty members — some with tenure — could take years to resolve.

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