After hiring a group which would streamline university practices last semester, the University of Wisconsin has recently received the results of a study detailing ways to combat decreasing funding from the government.

At a forum held Thursday, Interim UW Chancellor David Ward introduced the results as a way to battle the initial budget cuts given to the university in the 2011-2013 biennial budget and the recent announcement that the university will be facing increasing budget cuts through lapses that could total $65.7 million.

“It’s much harder to be chancellor today than it was 10 years ago in terms of how you manage resources, however the flexibility to manage them is better,” Ward said.

The project began in March and, after months of analysis, Huron has identified over 75 saving opportunities for the university to consider. 

“We will strive to deal with diminished state support and lapses, and we will strive to develop tuition policies that make more sense than simply capping them,” Ward said. “The sum of those two key elements in the revenues of the budget of the university is diminishing.”

The five areas analyzed with Huron’s findings presented included email and calendaring, computer bundles, data center aggregation, space utilization and demand management.

According to a statement from the event, findings say UW operates on over 72 email systems email systems throughout campus. Huron recommended UW adopt a common standard for all email and calendaring on campus for efficiency. This would save between $250,000 and $1 million annually.

Analysis of computer purchasing concluded that campus divisions, along with many other configurations, through various suppliers, purchase 20 plus standard Dell bundles. By buying through the same supplier $300,000 to $500,000 would be saved annually, the statement said.

Huron’s plan also suggests that bundles should be decided on with the involvement of user groups. 

Along with the four major data centers on campus, UW has dozens of server rooms and hundreds of single servers, according to a UW report on the Huron analysis and recommendation. With so many locations the cost of centrally offered services is high in comparison to the cost of local capacity in the buildings.

Huron proposed four methods of aggregating data centers, the benefits increasing with each model. Though further analysis is needed for accurate understanding of server distribution and costs, estimated savings would be $5 million annually, according to the statement from the event.

While UW purchases products through primary vendors, reducing the different types of things bought for the same use and buying the less expensive option of products without diminishing quality, according to the statement presented at the forum, could achieve savings of $1 million to $2 million.

Ward emphasized the importance of these findings in moving the university forward.

“We will remain a somewhat impoverished institution over the next half decade unless we find ways to address these issues,” he said.

This project for efficiency involves three phases, Ward said.

The first was Huron’s analysis and identification of opportunities. Phase two involves stakeholders’ feedback and deeper analysis. The third phase is implementing the new actions.

According to Darrell Bazzell, vice chancellor for administration, UW is between phases one and two and is awaiting permission to study areas further.