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Also by Kelsey Willems:

UW receives honor (November 10, 2005)
UW pediatrician wins award (November 17, 2005)
Student-parents find niche in child-care (December 2, 2005)
UW professor studies Newcastle Disease (December 8, 2005)
LGBT Campus Center holds heritage month (April 6, 2005)

by Kelsey Willems

Tuesday, February 15, 2005

The University of Wisconsin released the 2004 annual financial report last week, detailing UW’s past achievements while describing the decrease in state support to the Madison campus.

The report provides UW students and Wisconsin residents with a breakdown on how the university plans to achieve its goals.

The report included stories demonstrating how the university “promotes its research mission, continues its leadership in teaching and shares its findings statewide and globally to improve our lives,” UW Chancellor John Wiley said in a statement on the report’s website.

“[The report] gives UW students a sense of the progress we’re making towards our goals and the needs of students,” said Vice Chancellor of Administration Darrell Bazzell.

Editor of the report, Michael Penn, said it is important for UW to release the annual report as a record of accountability to the Wisconsin lawmakers and taxpayers.

“The university, like any institution, owes it to its stake holders to let them know what’s going on,” Penn said. “The annual report is sort of a regular way for us to say here’s where we stand, here’s the things we set out to do and here [are] the ways we’ve been living up to that promise.”

The report reveals UW’s progress on five areas of UW’s priorities, including promoting research, advancing learning, accelerating internalization, amplifying the Wisconsin Idea and maximizing human resources. Bazzell pointed specifically to advances in internationalization, as displayed in the report.

Penn explained how he — and the individuals he worked with — brought the annual report together.

“We’re in contact with a lot of people around the university, students and faculty, so what we do whenever we start working on the annual report [is] call together people around the office and ask what are the programs and things that have been going on in the past year to fit [the goals UW set for itself]?” Penn said.

The data in the report, which is collected by the Office of Budget Planning and Analysis, includes the sources of funds UW receives. The report shows funds from the state have decreased by $33 million and funds derived from private gifts, non-federal grants and segregated revenue have gradually increased from 15.2 percent to 19.3 percent in the past decade.

The revenue for the 2004-05 academic year consisted of 26.8 percent in federal funds and 21 percent in state funds. There was a 6.6 percent increase in funding for academic missions, a decrease of 2.4 percent funding for student support and a 7.4 percent increase for enterprise operations.

“Our aspirations are high and our sights are set on new breakthroughs,” Wiley said. “We have not — and will not — abandon our bedrock principles in the face of budgetary uncertainty.”

Also included is the budget allocation by each specific program.

-Natalie Rhoads contributed to this article.