Katrina Wallops Tulane University

Dec. 9, 2005 — -- Hurricane Katrina continues to hit Tulane University hard.

Still reeling from the August storm, the venerable 171-year-old university has announced it is laying off hundreds of faculty members, cutting sports programs, and eliminating a number of undergraduate majors -- including computer science and electrical engineering.

In what Tulane President Scott Cowen called "the most significant reinvention of a university in the United States in over a century," Tulane on Thursday announced sweeping cuts -- all in response to the $200 million in losses from Hurricane Katrina.

The school will resume classes next month, with 85 percent of its student body returning to campus.

The university, which is New Orleans' largest private employer, will cut nearly 230 faculty jobs -- 180 of them at the medical school and 50 at the Uptown campus. Administrators say those cuts represent about 4 percent of the university's work force of 6,000 prior to Hurricane Katrina. Tulane has already laid off 243 support workers and hundreds of part-time instructors.

"I deeply regret that employee reductions were necessary to secure the university's future," Cowen said in a prepared statement.

In an attempt to adjust to post-Katrina life in a smaller city, the medical school will reduce its clinical programs, focusing instead on research.

"The problem right now for Tulane students is that there are no people to take care of in New Orleans," said displaced fourth-year medical student Nick Scaletta, now studying at the University of Houston. Scaletta and other students will resume classes in New Orleans in the fall of 2006.

Additional cost-cutting will eliminate most undergraduate engineering majors -- except for biomedical and chemical engineering.

Tulane will also cancel eight athletic programs: men's track and cross country, men's and women's golf, men's and women's tennis, and women's soccer and swimming. Administrators say academic scholarships in those sports will still be honored.