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| | Tight state budgets hurting UA effort
Thursday, Mar 3, 2005 By David Robinson Arkansas News Bureau LITTLE ROCK - A lack of state money has hurt a 5-year-old effort to raise the status of the University of Arkansas, and tight state budgets threaten to continue that pattern. State funding has fallen short by $25 million to $34 million each year, according to Wednesday's update of the UA 2010 Commission report, which was first released in September 2001. The shortfall has been partially made up by higher-than-planned tuition hikes, but it also has meant that the UA has been unable to reach its goals for such things as teacher-student ratios and salaries for faculty. The goals are based on the average of peer institutions in Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Iowa and Texas. "When you look at where we needed to be, we have not met that benchmark on state appropriations," University of Arkansas Chancellor John White said Wednesday. He said he's hopeful the Legislature this session will close next year's $34 million gap by adopting a funding formula endorsed by the state's higher education leaders and Gov. Mike Huckabee. "I'm optimistic about where we're going," White said at a news conference to announce the new report, called Gaining Ground. "I think this General Assembly is going to step up and do something for public higher education in this session, and we're very excited about that." House Speaker Bill Stovall, D-Quitman, said Wednesday that despite his hope that more money for higher education will be approved in the current session, the reality is that it will be difficult for the state's public colleges to get the financial support they want. "I think that the General Assembly generally is motivated more by youth, seniors and developmentally disabled folks when it comes to general revenue more than they are higher education," Stovall said. "I don't have a lot of people from the constituency asking for funding additional money into higher education, but you certainly are going to hear about Medicaid services and corrections even, and prekindergarten and the youth and education. It's a tough battle." The Gaining Ground report points to numerous achievements since work was begun by the 2010 Commission, a group of more than 90 business, civic, education and government leaders and students. The effort on behalf of the Fayetteville campus is to make the school more nationally competitive. White said progress so far has gained his campus national recognition. "One word that people use around the country to describe what's happening at the university is amazing," White said. "It's just simply amazing." A lack of state financial support, however, has caused the school to lose ground in several areas, he said. For example, in a comparison with 54 peer universities, the Fayetteville campus since 1997 slipped 19 positions based on its student-to-faculty ratio and lost six positions due to its tuition increases. "Because we were not receiving the state support at the level projected in the Making the Case report we've had to increase tuition beyond what we put in at the basis for those projections, which was a 5 percent annual increase," White said. Despite significant increases in private donations to the UA's endowment fund in recent years, White said, it's unrealistic to expect private sources to make up the $34 million shortfall. He said it would require an additional $744 million or double the school's existing endowment to generate the $34 million through interest earnings. White said the UA could not in good conscience continue to place such a burden on students and their families. |
