Concerned Tufts staff members have distributed a petition in conjunction with Tufts Labor Coalition demanding that no workers be laid off as part of Tufts’ Operating Model Transformation, an initiative restructuring the university’s administrative functions.
Junior Ella Perin, a student organizing member of TLC, said the purpose of the petition is to show “the administration that [potential layoffs are] not a popular decision.” She emphasized that all members of the Tufts community should be concerned about layoffs, noting that the staff’s “working conditions are [students’] living and learning conditions.”
The Operating Model Transformation, announced in September, is meant “to more effectively steward our university’s resources and help staff have an even greater impact as they support the university's teaching, research, and civic engagement mission,” according to a frequently asked questions document sent to staff by the university.
The university says that staff changes are possible, though the transformation is still under discussion by senior leadership. Faculty, academic functions and research positions, however, are not under the scope of the transformation.
Financial pressures in 2024 and 2025 motivated the university to launch the transformation, according to University Executive Vice President Mike Howard. Tufts faced rising costs associated with a number of factors, including inflation, tightening the budget and federal changes making it harder for the university to fund programs aligned with its mission, he said.
Threats to research funding in 2025 “added this cloud of uncertainty to the overall financial environment and all of that was the backdrop for a series of conversations that we started to have at the senior levels of the organization … [about] what’s the best way for us to respond to this situation,” Howard said.
Work on the Operating Model Transformation started over the summer, prior to its official September launch. The transformation has three executive sponsors: University President Sunil Kumar, Executive Vice President Howard and Provost Caroline Genco. The transformation’s leadership involves many other members of the administration, including vice provosts, deans and administrative deans.
Concerned staff members created the petition in mid-October after they were notified about the Operating Model Transformation. TLC has supported them by circulating the petition as well as posters around campus that read “Tell Tufts: No Layoffs.”
Howard noted that staff have had multiple opportunities to provide input, including a survey that was sent to all faculty members asking them several questions on how they could be better supported in their roles and how they spend their time at their jobs. The university also held town halls and has an email where staff or other community members can send their concerns, he said.
Petition organizers say that the university has lacked transparency about the status of the project and possible layoffs. Many staff members also said that the survey has been insufficient and that they have not been able to give input into the transformation process, despite their jobs possibly being affected.
“While Tufts has offered staff a ‘confidential’ survey, it will not publish the results for us to see or let us meaningfully participate in the decision-making process,” the petition reads.
Howard noted the university has not currently decided on any specifics for the project and thus does not have specific information to share yet.
He explained that once the university has decided on more specific projects it will be undertaking as a part of the Operating Model Transformation, there will be more communications with staff updating them on the project.
The use of Deloitte as a third-party consultant has also raised concerns about the possibility of layoffs.
Perin said using a third-party consultant “removes the decisions a level outside of the university and outside of the university’s accountability … it means that it’s so much harder to find the information about it because it’s not being made by Tufts-employed people, which is really hard when you’re trying to figure out what’s going on.”
“Deloitte is supporting us on this project. We are leading it,” Howard said. “The reason that we partnered with Deloitte is because we don’t have the capacity at the university to do all the work required to do a transformation initiative like this properly.”
The Operating Model Transformation will continue to move through the planning phase until January or February, Howard said, when the university is expected to release more information on the initiative.
