Leon Osterweil was having a busy Friday morning. Just before being interviewed for this story, he finished an important phone call; right after this interview, he rushed off to another meeting.

However, in the half-hour given to the Collegian, Osterweil detailed decimation. The College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics’ Dean told of a college expecting to lose 15 percent of its total faculty to retirement, 10 percent of it to early retirement alone.

“We expect to lose 35 faculty members out of our 240,” Osterweil said. “25 of those will be lost to offered early retirement.”

Encompassing Astronomy, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Biology, Chemistry, Computer Science, Geosciences, Mathematics and Statistics, Physics and Polymer Science and Engineering, Osterweil’s College expects to lose professors at all levels of scholarship and from all academic departments.

“It’s Mathematics that’s worst off,” Osterweil said. The department expects to lose a staggering 12 professors to combined retirements. Astronomy will also be hard hit, Osterweil said. Further damaging the school will be the retirement of clerical staff.

“We’re losing the individuals who keep track of chemicals, who do the storekeeping,” Osterweil said. “This is a scientific loss as well as a clerical one.”

Similar to other School and College chairmen – specifically the School of Management’s Tom O’Brien and Education’s Bailey Jackson – everything possible was being done to preserve programs that students have come to expect. As such, Osterweil expects to attempt to save as much money as possible while maintaining those same programs.

“There will be no program cuts this semester,” the Dean confirmed, instead pointing to the fall semester as the place to look for possible pain. He is frank in saying that he expects to offer far fewer classes in the fall with fewer sections.

“We’re hamstrung by the lack of resources,” Osterweil says, saying that the University’s only response, thus far, has been a reference to its bare cupboard. The Dean says that right now, the only answer anyone can expect is a collective, “we have no more resources to help with.”

But unlike other Schools – who explain that the best way to hedge losses is to bring in adjunct professors to teach classes – Osterweil is iffy on such a proposal.

“There may be some money available for adjunct professors, but I am nervous we don’t have as much of a window to hire as we might have had otherwise,” Osterweil says, adding that he is unsure of the quality of people he can bring in to help.

“There is life after these cuts and it is that which we have to prepare for. We have a good school and we need to invest in keeping it at a level where a very high quality product can be delivered to students,” Osterweil said. If anything could be cited as the Computer Science professor’s main message, it was that. Like O’Brien in an earlier article, Osterweil argues that the University can’t fold under the pressure of the cuts. “I don’t want to see a watering down of our product so we’re not going to hire sub-par faculty to fill in the gaps.”

It’s a critical, honest and stunning statement, all at the same time. He goes on.

“If we hire those sub-par individuals, we will have made a terrible mistake,” he says. Of course, he also acknowledges that the lack of adjuncts will be problematic.

Maybe.

Perhaps Osterweil’s biggest problem is his inability to plan more than a few months into the future. While the College isn’t pulling back from commitments right away (for instance, it will continue to recruit graduate students in the same numbers that it always has), Osterweil acknowledges that he is left to “work on conjecture” when it comes to planning.

Of some assistance is the University administration, which the Dean cites as supportive and helpful.

“I deal with the provost and the chancellor [Charlena Seymour and Marcellete Williams, respectively – ed.] and they’ve trying the best they can,” Osterweil says. “I don’t sense any hostility or reticence in trying to deal with them because they are daily trying to deal with tidal waves of bad news.”

Despite such negatives description – which makes for great newspaper copy – The Dean is positively focused on his and the University’s future.

“Look, I’m trying to focus people on the fact that we’ll still be here, and that we go through ups and downs, and that right now, yes, there’s a perfect storm of bad news. But we’re blessed by a cadre of administrators and faculty who are dedicated to guiding us through this storm,” Osterweil said. “We have to ready ourselves for two or three years down the road so we can be ready to do some incredible science.”

After speaking with such grandeur though, Osterweil slowed himself down. He is defiantly in his final statement of the interview.

“This hurts,” he said. “Students will be unhappy and rightfully so, but we’re going to commit to our future. This has all been a tremendous shame, but we’re committing ourselves to a better future.”

He then had somewhere to be.