Senate budget proposes big cuts to higher education

“The Senate budget has a smaller net reduction to higher education than either the governor’s budget or the house budget,” said Democratic Senator Derek Kilmer at the Senate budget press conference April 12^th. After hearing these words, many Western students breathed a sigh of relief.

But budgets are complicated things, and after looking at the facts, students might feel like that sigh of relief was premature. 

The Senate’s budget has the lowest net reduction to higher education, but it actually proposes the biggest reduction in state funds for higher education. The Senate says their budget has the lowest net reduction because, although they propose the largest cuts to higher education, they also propose the highest tuition increases, which will help offset the reduction in state funds.

 All the budgets propose tuition increases for each of the next two years, but the Senate’s budget proposes the highest; 16 percent increases for Western. The Governor’s budget proposed tuition increases of 11 percent while the House of Representatives proposed 13 percent increases for Western.

So, the Senate is proposing the biggest reductions in state funding and the highest increases in tuition? Yeah, that sigh was definitely premature.

That’s not to say the Senate’s budget is the “worst” for higher education. Honestly, none of them are particularly appealing, but there are pros and cons to each of them. Let’s look at how each of the budgets compare in the table below: In the end, all the budgets propose huge cuts to higher education, and the biggest difference between them is the increases in tuition. If this legislative session has showed us anything, it’s that the state will continue to disinvest in public higher education.

Although no one is sure how the university will implement proposed cuts, from the looks of these proposals, we know tuition will be increasing significantly. The higher the proposed tuition increases, the lower the net cut to the universities, as shown by the table. Students are paying more to preserve the quality of education that Western provides.

Now we’re waiting on the next budget, which will reflect a compromise between the Governor’s proposed budget, the House’s, and the Senate’s. Until then, it’s never too late to learn more about higher education funding. Check out the useful links section on this blog for more information, or to look at the Senate’s budget for yourself, click here.

House of Representatives Releases Proposed Budget

We can all breathe a small sigh of relief. The House of Representatives released their proposed budget and, although it proposes tuition increases of 11.5 to 13 percent for each of the next two years and cuts Western’s budget by $47 million, the budget could have been worse.

“It was bad for higher education,” Western President Bruce Shepard said at the April 4 Western Faculty Senate meeting. “It was not bad for Western.”

Legislators might have gone easier on Western because there was a swell of support for higher education that was unlike any other biennium. While representatives once said that they never heard from people who are concerned about higher education, this is no longer the case. According to the United Faculty of Washington State blog, legislators so far have received over 5,000 emails, over 1,000 phone calls, over 500 letters, and over 1,200 signatures on petitions relating to higher education.

In addition, legislators recognized that per student funding was very different at each of Washington’s higher education institutions. Washington State University, University of Washington, The Evergreen State College, Central Washington University and Eastern Washington University were all receiving more funding per student than Western. During this round of budget cuts, Western received the smallest cuts so that funding per student is slightly closer to equal between the institutions.

Despite this groundswell of support, some officials in Olympia still seem to overlook how amazing our state universities are. Representative Ross Hunter said at a House operating budget press conference that he wanted to tie higher education funding to making improvements in universities. “I’d like college presidents to wake up in the morning and think, ‘how is that kid going to get that class to graduate on time?’ I want them to think about that every minute of every day,” said Hunter at the press conference. He went on to say that decreasing the time to degree by one year at universities would make them 20 percent more productive.

As I’ve pointed out on News for Vikings, Washington already has the most productive universities in the country. Furthermore, President Bruce Shepard said in his letter to the legislature that decreasing state funding for Western would actually increase the time to degree.