Boston University is the latest local school to layoff employees and implement budget cuts as the feds slash funding to colleges.

BU on Monday announced that 120 employees will be let go, and the university will enact a 5% budget cut for the coming fiscal year.

“While we have worked hard to minimize impacts on our community, today we share the difficult news of layoffs,” BU officials wrote to faculty and staff. “In coming days, the University will eliminate about 120 staff positions and about 120 vacancies. In addition, around 20 positions will undergo a change in schedule.

“Every effort has been made to limit the number of layoffs, and these actions will apply to approximately 1% of our employees,” the officials added. “Still, we know that any reduction in staffing is painful… This is a day of loss for all of us. There is no way around this. We know our community may need time to adjust to these difficult changes. Yet, it is also a necessary step in ensuring our future.”

Employees being let go will receive separation packages and career transitional services.

BU in the spring had warned of budget cuts due to financial headwinds.

“Recent and ongoing federal actions and funding cuts are affecting our research enterprise as well as day-to-day operations,” the officials wrote on Monday. “Uncertainty remains about the full extent of potential challenges to our core mission of teaching, learning, and research.

“As we take part in a national renegotiation of how the country’s higher education model will be funded, universities face other pressures such as rising inflation, changing demographics, declining graduate enrollment, and the need to adapt to new technologies,” they added.

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Boston University’s total revenue was $3.3 billion for the tax year from July 2022 to June 2023, according to the institution’s 990 form. That total revenue of $3.3 billion was a 17% jump from the total revenue of $2.8 billion from July 2020 to June 2021.

Meanwhile, BU’s total salaries amounted to $1.4 billion from July 2022 to June 2023 — a 23% increase from $1.2 billion during the tax year from July 2020 to June 2021.

The highest earners from July 2022 to June 2023 included then-President Robert Brown, who in his final year as BU’s top leader took home a total compensation of $2.6 million, which included a base compensation of $1.3 million.

The BU employee with the highest base compensation was professor and physician Tony Tannoury, who had a base compensation of $1.8 million and overall took home more than $1.9 million.

The other highest compensated employees were: professor and physician Xinning Li with almost $1.5 million; professor and oral surgeon Pushkar Mehra with $1.4 million; university provost Jean Morrison with almost $1.4 million; CIO and assistant treasurer Clarissa Hunnewell with $1.3 million; professor and physician William Creevy with $1.2 million; and medical campus provost Karen Antman with $1 million.