Students were expressing fears and concerns all over social media after hearing rumors of the university closing in the upcoming spring semester.
On Oct. 12 President David Glassman sent out an email to students, faculty and staff informing them Eastern would remain open the following semester and beyond.
While Glassman said students should not fear about the school closing, the school is still in financial crisis because of the absence of a budget in Illinois.
In Monday’s edition of The Daily Eastern News, an article titled “Administration explains university contingencies” explains the university’s efforts to use contingency plans to prevent the university from shutting down.
The university may be in an awful financial situation, but at least something is getting done to prevent this from occurring.
The plans consist of receiving funds from the state, using reserved funds and obtaining a loan from a bank.
The ideal plan would be to receive state appropriations, but this is not possible at the moment and this not only puts Eastern in a difficult financial situation, but other state schools as well.
Universities rely on state appropriations, but when Illinois cannot pass a budget, this puts everyone in a difficult situation.
Nine public state universities even sent a letter to Gov. Bruce Rauner urging to end the budget stalemate.
Glassman also said Eastern would be using its reserved funds, but according to the article in The News, these funds have already been in use for several year.
Not knowing how much funds are available could create fear in thinking about how much reserved funds are actually available and how long Eastern can rely on them.
The last option involves the school getting a loan from a bank that is large enough to loan the university money.
Therefore, the university would have to get a loan for money that needs to be approved by the state, which would not even need to happen if there was a budget.
This is a situation that Eastern does not want to be in, but it is one of few options available.
As mentioned earlier, at least something is being done to keep the university open.
Eastern will continue to fight and stay open, and the university is not going down without a fight.
Glassman said in the article that students have nothing to be afraid about.
Ignore the rumors and stop helping spread the rumors of Eastern shutting down.
Everything is being done to keep this university alive and it will continue to be open for future semesters.

The daily editorial is the majority opinion of the editorial board of The Daily Eastern News.