Florence-Darlington Tech cuts 15 full-time positions
By Bobby Bryant
Editor
editor@newsandpress.net
Fifteen full-time faculty and staff positions at Florence-Darlington Technical College have been eliminated because of declining enrollment, probably worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic, the college’s interim president says.
Interim President Ed Bethea said the cuts, effective Sept. 1, amount to about $1.25 million a year in salaries. He also said the college is eliminating its paralegal and automated office technology programs.
“It was not unexpected,” Bethea told the News & Press. “We’ve been in a period of declining enrollment for 10 years.”
The coronavirus pandemic “played a role to some degree,” Bethea said. “COVID probably played a role in keeping enrollment down a bit.”
Bethea said the college now has about 3,300 full-time students, down from about 6,200 a decade ago. The college now has about 200 full-time employees. Bethea said he believes the ratio of faculty/staff to students is just about where it should be.