TRU seeks partnerships, solutions to financial challenges on overseas trip

TRU eyes overseas solutions

Photo: KTW File

The Brown Family House of Learning on the campus of Thompson Rivers University.

Thompson Rivers University’s new president spent nearly $30,000 on travel in her first four months on the job — but she says the number will look far less dramatic by the end of the fiscal year.

TRU president Dr. Airini’s travel expenses between July 1 and Oct. 31 totalled $29,152.38.

Comparatively, previous president Brett Fairbairn’s total annual expenses were $66,600 in 2023-24, $31,400 in 2022-23, $19,370 in 2021-22, no expenses due to the COVID-19 pandemic the year prior, and $31,500 in 2019-2020.

Speaking with Castanet, Airini said more than half of her expenses so far this year are due to a trip to New Zealand and Australia in October — accounting for $17,650.

“If we take a short window view over the whole year it can look high, but over the full year it’s going to balance out,” Airini said.

“Overall, for the budget that’s put in place, we’re nine months into the fiscal year and there’s about 40 per cent remaining in the budget, so I’m comfortable with that.”

TRU has budgeted $55,000 annually for the presidential travel since the 2024-25 fiscal year, before Airini assumed the position. Prior to that, $30,000 was budgeted.

Airini said travel costs can vary year to year depending on university priorities, and her travel expenses will now be posted online every quarter. That was previously done once a year.

Trip aimed to build partnerships

Airini was joined by Secwépmc special advisor to the president Dr. Garry Gottfriedson and VP of administration and finance Matt Milovick on the October trip.

She said the purpose of the first leg of the trip was to further international Indigenous research and education collaborations with universities in her native New Zealand.

She said part of the trip was to help find “balance in our relations with Indigenous peoples,” one of the challenges identified when she first arrived at TRU over the summer.

The second half of the time in Australia was spent building partnerships to help solve TRU’s financial challenges.

“The fastest way to stabilize TRU is to learn directly from universities that have navigated multi-million dollar deficits, and then for us to secure partnerships that help us to diversify our revenue and to take action for cost avoidance, as well,” she said.

“That’s why we joined the UniForum study tour and why we’ve been negotiating purposeful affiliations, and that’s helping us get this kind of positive shift from projected deficits and to help us face what’s coming up in the next year.”

Earlier this year TRU was predicting an $8.32 million deficit, but that’s now swung to an $1.27 million surplus as of the university’s second quarter forecast. About $16.9 million in reductions is expected to be needed in the 2026-27 budget.

TRU has been cutting jobs and scaling back expenses to balance its budget, including reductions to non-compensation items like travel.

Airini said outcomes of the trip include establishing working relationships with six universities and one secondary school. Four affiliation agreements are expected to be finalized in early 2026 as well, two of which are specific to Indigenous language revitalization.

Investing in new initiative

TRU is one of 10 Canadian institutions and 50 globally that participate in UniForum. It’s a benchmarking initiative that compares data on the effectiveness and efficiency of universities against each other, according to TRU’s website.

Airini said UniForum led to TRU establishing connections with 12 other universities in the “UniForum network.” She said those connections will assist in solving TRU’s financial challenges.

“One of the things that we’re able to see because of that investment is how we might be able to create efficiencies in our services and release investments so it can be reallocated to our core mission around teaching and research,” Airini said.

Airini told the university’s senate last month that TRU is investing $300,000 annually into the initiative for four years.

She said initial data from the initiative was first received in October. A finalized report was received last week and Airini said TRU is in the early stages of analyzing it now.

“We’re looking to share findings with the university community, including through governance, so I can see that happening in the new year,” Airini said.

“What we’re realizing is that this has been a high-value investment, we’ve got an opportunity now to look at benchmarks, to look at comparators and to position ourselves better than we were able to do before.”