Implementing the March to Sustainability Plan

Dear Rider faculty and staff,

At the Board of Trustees meeting this past Sunday, November 30, the Board formally approved an implementation approach to the March to Sustainability Plan. With this decision, the administration has immediately begun moving forward with the difficult but necessary steps described in my previous communications and the plan itself to return Rider to financial stability and begin building a Reimagined Rider. These steps include the personnel and compensation impacts that we deeply regret having to include in the plan. The specific decisions affecting union members are being communicated directly today to union leadership and to the affected faculty and athletics staff.

As I indicated in my message of last Tuesday, the thoughtful contributions of students, staff and faculty were instrumental in improving the final implementation approach for the plan. Implementation changes include ensuring that every Rider employee receives a living wage through the plan, key changes to preserve certain priority adjunct benefits, and other changes to benefits, all while still ensuring we achieve the necessary savings to stabilize Rider’s financial situation. We are grateful for this invaluable community influence on the plan and the Board’s support on implementing your suggestions.

Today, we welcomed visitors from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education to campus, consistent with their request several weeks ago to make this visit as part of their October decision to place the University’s accreditation on probation due to Rider’s financial situation. I want to thank those who were able to join the forum with Dr. Terence Peavy and Dr. Suzan Harkness from Middle States for your thoughtful dialogue. We discussed the plan in detail with these representatives today and, following their continuing review process, expect Middle States to decide upon the status of Rider’s continuing accreditation during its March 2026 meeting.

More detail about all these matters, and all aspects of the plan, is available in our FAQs.

The formal implementation of the March to Sustainability Plan begins a new era for Rider University. We will build for the future, determined that the sacrifices this time has required must fuel a stronger University, a Rider renewed in its commitment to providing an education that changes lives.

I have summarized these many important steps before, so I will not do so again here. I will simply say that, as the March to Sustainability Plan now goes forward, this University community has made possible, with its ideas and its determination, its commitment to our students and to Rider’s future, an institution that is reimagining itself to live up to Rider’s 160-year history and the best of what our students expect of us. I look forward to working with you as we bring this Reimagined Rider into being and to asking our alumni and friends to help us in this vital endeavor.

Sincerely,

John R. Loyack, CPA, MBA
President