Board urged to stop education budget slashing

Advocate staff photo by ARTHUR D. LAUCK -- State Commissioner of Higher Education Jim Purcell on Thursday asked Board of Regents members to lobby Louisiana legislators for more support for public colleges and universities.

State Commissioner of Education Jim Purcell on Thursday pushed the state’s higher education policy board to lobby the Legislature for more support for public colleges.

Louisiana’s colleges and universities have lost more than $625 million to state budget cuts in the past four years, according to an accounting that Purcell presented to the Louisiana Board of Regents.

“We need you to help us,” Purcell told the Louisiana Board of Regents.

Several members of the Regents said they’d support talking to legislators and other influential people, but a few insisted that higher education leaders need to stop harping on budget cuts and look to the future.

“We are in an intensifying crisis within the state,” said regents Chairman Clinton “Bubba” Rasberry Jr., of Shreveport. “It hasn’t been caused by one particular individual or a particular legislature ... from this point on I’m only interested in how we move forward.”

Purcell’s call for help and subsequent path forward came as he answered the regents’ request for an update on the state of higher education.

Purcell said Louisiana’s low tuition compared with schools in surrounding states coupled with five straight years of budget cuts have put an outsize burden on colleges and universities.

“A lot of states are coming out of the recession and starting to reinvest in higher education,” Purcell said. “We are not one of those.”

Institutions were able to offset some of the losses from budget cuts with more than $300 million in tuition increases, he said.

But the gap between the amount of money schools have to work with in 2008 versus 2013 — $294 million — is very significant, according to Purcell.

To make his point, Purcell singled out Baton Rouge Community College — a school which has lost more than $11 million, or 52 percent, of its state funding since 2008.

“BRCC is in the fastest-growing city in the state, and they’ve gone from $20 million to $9 million. That’s more than a 50 percent cut,” Purcell said. “The question is, are we doing the things we need to do.”

He added that continued budget cuts are hampering schools’ ability to train students who can meet workforce demands.

According to the regents, in that same time period:

• LSU’s Baton Rouge campus has lost $102 million, or 44 percent of its budget.
• Southern University’s Baton Rouge campus lost about $25 million, or 47 percent of its budget.
• The University of New Orleans lost $34 million in state funding, or 48 percent of its budget.

Purcell suggested Louisiana’s higher education system would fare better if the Legislature were to relinquish tuition increasing authority to the state’s four college and university systems; if tuition rates would be market based; if schools were allowed to charge more for high-cost, high-demand programs; and if schools were able to charge tuition per credit hour.

Currently students are only charged for the first 12 credit hours they take in a semester.

“All of these options need legislative approval,” Purcell said.

But Regents Vice Chairman Joseph Wiley, of Gonzales, said he and others run into problems trying to lobby the Legislature for more money when Louisiana has recently seen increases in the number of students enrolling in postsecondary education and the number of students graduating.

“When people see that, the folks outside of our huddle can’t see any significant negative impacts” of the budget cuts, he said.

Wiley said the regents need to come up with a new strategy other than complaining about budget cuts before legislators start tuning them out.

“We really need to get off what’s happened in the last four years,” he said.

Wiley suggested that higher education leaders need to ask themselves what each individual school needs to survive.

“Our challenge to higher education is to find out what is it that we don’t have today that we need,” Wiley said. “Is it salary increases, is it more facility maintenance?”

Wiley suggested the individual college systems, and not the regents, need to make clear to legislators what they are lacking as the best way to move forward.

Comments

1) Comment by Buy college degree - 09/04/2013

Education is the backbone of any economy and thus cutting budget on educational funds will do no good. Online education is an increasing trend but not the solution. There are sites like http://onlinelifeexperiencedegree.org/the-benefits-of-a-college- education/

2) Comment by agagent - 11/01/2013

There are plenty of fees, other than tuition, which higher education has been increasing all along. Let’s hope the students can afford it and get a job when they graduate.

3) Comment by jeffsadow - 11/01/2013

Here's what I want to know ... even with the numbers Purcell mentions, this means LA higher education is still getting $75 million more from the state than it was in 2004, and over $300 million more total, for educating 8,000 more students (less than 4 percent increase) in eight years. How does any of this justify significantly larger state spending?

4) Comment by yadodge0501 - 11/01/2013

There are many ways to reduce the cost of college level education and there is great resistance to putting this into place. All courses should be put online, all texts should be put onllne and all testing should be online. The cost of a college 3 hour course could probably be brought under 25$. Louisiana could lead the nation in promoting low cost, effective and easily accessible college level education, but remains stuck in the high cost, low efficiency education model of the past 2000 years. No tears of sympathy here for their inability to gouge money from the State

5) Comment by agagent - 11/01/2013

Medicaid is the main cause of the state's deficits. Medicaid needs a budget which puts limitations on spending. For example, Medicaid cannot continue to pay for the vast majority of all births in Louisiana. Medicaid is easily scammed.

6) Comment by agagent - 11/01/2013

It is the same scenario almost every year: The legislature over estimates revenue and the protected portion of the state budget, including public schools, are funded on an inflated revenue estimate. By mid-year revenue does not meet expectations and the smaller, unprotected portion of the budget, including higher education, receive budget cuts. Change the constitution placing the entire budget subject to mid-year budget cuts. That way the cuts are spread out. Probably the legislature will estimate revenue more accurately, as the now unprotected portion of the budget will not benefit when revenue is over-estimated. Now the protected portion of the budget, like public schools, benefit when revenue is over-estimated.

7) Comment by crazycajun - 11/01/2013

What booby wants booby gets,period.

8) Comment by 8point6 - 11/01/2013

mr. purcell, try calling, emailing, tweeting, texting, Exxon, AT&T, the Shaw group, Walmart, etc, etc, for dedicated donations to fill the void. If they are donating, then, ask them to give MORE of their "fair share". My "progressive" friends are always bellyaching about "evil" large corporations. This would be a good way to let them show their concern for higher education.

9) Comment by crabby - 11/01/2013

Funding education is the role of the government. If you want to reduce crime, poverty, and all those things that make Louisiana last on all the lists (and the laughing stock of America), you start with educated citizens.

10) Comment by Being_Stupid - 11/01/2013

Funding higher education is not the role of Government. The reason higher education is so expensive and these college administrators are so overpaid is because Government subsidizes higher education. If Government would just get out of the way, perhaps the ridiculous price for higher education would come down to more reasonable fair market value and affordability, without the need for students to put themselves into indentured servitude for the rest of their lives so they can pay back their student loans and debt for life.