By Ally Uhlendorf and Isabella Darcy
Editor-in-Chief and Managing Editor
As the upcoming 2026 fiscal year approaches, the College is continuing to advocate for appropriate funding. The Signal held an interview with President Michael Bernstein on May 7 to discuss the College’s plans going into the next fiscal and academic year.
The College is projected to finish out the 2025 fiscal year in balance on June 30. To prepare for the 2026 fiscal year, the College is currently working on a budget to present to the Board of Trustees in mid-to-late June.
The College’s budget proposal for FY26 is presently too large, and needs to be reduced before it is presented to the Board. Bernstein attributed this to there being numerous funding requests from many individuals, as well as rising utilities costs.
“If we just simply did everything everyone wants, we’d have an unbalanced budget,” Bernstein said. “We're not gonna be able to do that.”
Originally going over budget and later making adjustments to it is “typical” during the pre-approval process, according to Bernstein.
Once the budget for FY26 is approved, the College’s five-year model for its budgeting will be adjusted accordingly.
“The five-year model continues to look very promising,” said Bernstein. “In light of added revenue from the new [School of Graduate, Global, and Online Education], we are continuing to monitor costs.”
Also, by June 30, the state of New Jersey will decide how much funding it will allocate to the College for FY26. In past fiscal years, the College received significantly less funding from the state than it requested.
For current FY25, the College requested a little over $84 million, according to a copy of its state funding request. However, it received just over $34.5 million, according to the state budget.
Along with receiving less than it requested, the College saw the lowest 10-year difference in state allocations between fiscal year 2014 and fiscal year 2024 out of all New Jersey senior public institutions of higher education, according to New Jersey state appropriations budgets. The College was the only one of these institutions to receive a single-digit percent increase in funding, while the others received double and triple-digit percent increases.
Administrators, faculty, staff and students have been advocating for more funding for the College. They have written letters to elected officials, attended hearings and spoken directly to New Jersey officeholders.
More funding would allow the College to hire more faculty and staff, resolve deferred maintenance, improve campus facilities, purchase new equipment and overall effectively execute the College’s mission, according to Bernstein.
Currently, the College is working on a fundraising campaign. According to Bernstein, the formal campaign will be rolling out during the fall semester. To prepare for the capital campaign, Bernstein is hosting conversations with alumni, Board of Trustees members and TCNJ Foundation members to discuss what leadership roles they can play in the campaign.
“We’ve been looking at the pavilion project and some other major fundraising projects, and that's all part of this general issue about planning for a major fundraising campaign,” Bernstein said. “What are the key priorities? What’s the timing to complete one project? What’s the next project that comes to the top priority?”
Additionally, with the LIONS Plan finally complete, the president wants to focus on implementing proposals that were created by Coordinated Action Teams. Specifically, he wants to focus on finalizing the library project and renovations. These renovation design plans are aimed to be finalized by the end of the summer, according to Bernstein.
As library renovations occur over the next year, the president plans to keep the College’s spirit shop housed in the Barnes and Noble located in Campus Town — so long as the store remains open.
Going into the 2025-2026 academic year, Bernstein is looking forward to onboarding the new first-year class at the College. Currently, the administration is sorting through deposits for incoming first-year students and preparing for the fall semester.
Before he gets the ball rolling on the upcoming semester, Bernstein will be spending the beginning of his summer celebrating his daughter’s graduation at the University of Southern California’s Graduate School. He will also be spending time with his sisters on Eastern Long Island, something that has become a beloved family tradition.
