Officials will present reports on the University’s annual academic metrics and provide a financial update on the Medical Faculty Associates at a Faculty Senate meeting Friday.
Chief Financial Officer Bruno Fernandes and MFA Chief Executive Officer Bill Elliott will introduce the report on MFA financial updates. The MFA — a nonprofit organization that includes faculty from the School of Medicine & Health Sciences and physicians from GW Hospital — accrued more than $272 million in debt to GW and $120 million to other entities since 2018, per GW’s fiscal year 2024 consolidated financial statement.
The organization lost more than $107 million in FY2024, more than doubling officials’ projected deficit. At the October 2023 Faculty Senate meeting, Fernandes said the MFA likely won’t break even by the end of FY2024 and would lose another $30 million to $50 million within FY2024, walking back on previous break-even projections after the MFA lost nearly $80 million in FY2023 and another $80 million in FY2022, according to the financial statements audited each fall by accounting firm Grant Thornton, LLP.
Former interim University President Mark Wrighton retracted officials’ projection that the MFA would break even by the end of FY2023 in January 2023, making Fernandes’ announcement the second consecutive year that officials have backpedaled on their forecast of the MFA’s finances. Faculty senators have raised concerns about the MFA’s financial status for years.
Sarah Wagner, a faculty senator and the co-chair of the senate’s Educational Policy and Technology Committee, asked University President Ellen Granberg at the Senate’s February meeting whether she, Fernandes and Provost Chris Bracey created and shared a report with GW Board of Trustees’ Academic Affairs Committee about the impacts and opportunity costs of the MFA’s ongoing losses on the University’s mission of advancing education across its schools.
The Faculty Senate voted in February 2024 requesting officials pen an annual report on the losses by March 1, 2024, and by Feb. 1 of every following year. Faculty senators went into a closed-door session during February’s meeting to hear a report on the financial status of the MFA.
Bracey will present a report on the University’s Annual Core Indicators ranging from international student enrollment to faculty tenure track data. The report highlights a drop in 237 international students from fall 2023 to fall 2024, according to this year’s annual report. The report also shows a drop in tenure status for regular, research and special service faculty from 62.2 percent to 60.9 percent.
Faculty diversity increased between 2021 and 2023 with the number of Black faculty having increased by 29 members and the number of Asian faculty having increased by 17 members due to “intentional” hiring efforts, according to last year’s annual report.
Amita Vya, FSEC liaison for the Educational Policy and Technology Committee, and Eric Grynaviski, a member of the Subcommittee on Future Enrollment Planning, will introduce a resolution to reduce barriers for transfer students. The resolution recommends that University President Ellen Gramberg and Bracey form a University-level working group to enhance the transfer student experience by creating programs such as a transfer Living-Learning Community and providing courses featuring the D.C. experience to encourage social interaction.
Officials will also elect the Nominating Committee for the 2025-2026 Faculty Senate Executive Committee and introduce nominations for membership to Senate Standing Committees.
Officials will introduce Keith Crandall, a new senate member representing the Milken Institute School of Public Health.
Granberg, Bracey and Faculty Senate Executive Committee Chair Ilana Feldman will also share additional reports.
