GPSS IN THE NEWS
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UW'S GUTSY REACH
Source: Seattle Times
Author: Editorial
Date: Jul 26, 2006
University of Washington President Mark Emmert and his regents are making a bold statement about the dire situation of their university.
The regents approved a budget request last week that asks for a 20-percent increase from the state's general fund. Failing that, they want to try a six-year experiment in which the regents set tuition for undergraduate students, something the Legislature does now. Part of any increased tuition would go to financial aid to diminish the impact on middle-class students. It's a gutsy reach, given the historic two-steps-forward-one-step-back relationship between the Legislature and its higher-education system.
But the idea should not be dismissed out of hand. This is a year of soul-searching about education funding. The governor's Washington Learns initiative is looking at how education from birth to graduate school is paid for, and the private Prosperity Partnership is looking at education infrastructure as a component of economic health.
What the state has been doing is not working. It has a constitutional mandate that makes K-12 education its "paramount duty"; entitlement programs, such as Medicaid, that must be funded; and more prisons to build.
The higher-education system gets the leftovers. Even with an admirable infusion this biennium, the state's universities remain behind their peers in terms of spending per student. UW officials say the gap is about $4,000 per student.
Some might say this is just the UW making its annual whine for more money. It's annual because they don't get it usually. Even when lawmakers have in the past raised tuition, they often clawed back money for other parts of government — a tax on students. That should stop.
Any investment should be balanced with heavy concern for low-income and middle-class students' ability to pay. The state's Higher Education Coordinating Board director questions whether the UW's experiment might topple a popular pre-paid tuition plan. The plan should be protected.
Now is the time to think differently about higher-education funding. The conversation will be difficult, uncomfortable and exercised, b
The regents approved a budget request last week that asks for a 20-percent increase from the state's general fund. Failing that, they want to try a six-year experiment in which the regents set tuition for undergraduate students, something the Legislature does now. Part of any increased tuition would go to financial aid to diminish the impact on middle-class students. It's a gutsy reach, given the historic two-steps-forward-one-step-back relationship between the Legislature and its higher-education system.
But the idea should not be dismissed out of hand. This is a year of soul-searching about education funding. The governor's Washington Learns initiative is looking at how education from birth to graduate school is paid for, and the private Prosperity Partnership is looking at education infrastructure as a component of economic health.
What the state has been doing is not working. It has a constitutional mandate that makes K-12 education its "paramount duty"; entitlement programs, such as Medicaid, that must be funded; and more prisons to build.
The higher-education system gets the leftovers. Even with an admirable infusion this biennium, the state's universities remain behind their peers in terms of spending per student. UW officials say the gap is about $4,000 per student.
Some might say this is just the UW making its annual whine for more money. It's annual because they don't get it usually. Even when lawmakers have in the past raised tuition, they often clawed back money for other parts of government — a tax on students. That should stop.
Any investment should be balanced with heavy concern for low-income and middle-class students' ability to pay. The state's Higher Education Coordinating Board director questions whether the UW's experiment might topple a popular pre-paid tuition plan. The plan should be protected.
Now is the time to think differently about higher-education funding. The conversation will be difficult, uncomfortable and exercised, b