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NAU President John D. Haeger hosted a forum on March 27 where he discussed the university’s future and state education. He also focused on economic uncertainty in the nation and the state and how that would affect the university in the coming semesters.
Haeger spent much of his time talking about K-12 education and what he considers deplorable education figures for the United States and especially Arizona. He cited statistics by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development that rank the United States as 21 in high school completion rates of developed nations and 15 for college completion rates.
“There are students who can’t attend college because they can’t afford it, or students who just aren’t qualified in general, and the university is reaching out to this level,” said ASNAU president Tom Wahl.
Haeger has high hopes for Gov. Napolitano’s P-20 Council, a group created to bring Arizona schools up to nationwide standards. The council also aims to improve the high school and middle school systems to prepare students for higher education and the world after high school.
Haeger said just to reach the national average in education, Arizona will have to raise high school graduation rates by 4 percent, higher education retention rates by 8 percent and community college transfer rates by 10 percent.
Haeger also spoke about the economy, especially the state deficit of $1.2 billion and what it means for NAU funding. He tried to quell fears by telling the audience the economy is, by nature, cyclical, and the continued growth in enrollment guarantees growth in university budget.
Haeger supports a proposed state stimulus package to universities that he believes will energize many struggling industries in the state and Flagstaff. The proposed stimulus package would give $1.4 billion to state universities in hopes that stimulus expenditure will boost the state’s economy.
Plans have already been made for the stimulus money in hopes that it will eventually come through. The proposed plans include many upgrades to current facilities and infrastructure, as well construction of new buildings for health professions and undergraduate classes.
Rich Williams is heading up ASNAU analysis of the stimulus package and said it is still too early to predict exactly what would come of the package.
“In talking with the NAU administration; it doesn’t sound like it’s going to impact our tuition,” Williams said. “But again, it’s still early on and it’s hard to tell what exactly the long-term effects will be, especially if state funding dropped down in a couple of years.”
Williams said the state universities will have to begin paying 20 percent of the total debt service cost in 2010, the state will pick up the other 80 percent.
NAU administration hopes the current debt service budget will cover it. NAU currently has about $4 million in that budget for previously built buildings that have recently been paid off. Williams said the hope is that budget will cover the debt service cost for NAU’s portion.
Another possible plan to correct the current deficit is massive cuts, which Haeger believes to be a mistake. He said the worst-case scenario is for both the stimulus package and cuts to take place, putting considerable pressure on NAU to pay for stimulus bonds while trying to cut an already tight budget.
Haeger said faculty raises will not be as large this year, but they will continue to try not to lose ground in salaries. He also said the growing student population will necessitate new hires, despite an uncertain budget.
Haeger was also critical of many state policies directed at universities that he considers unwise. There is an effort to cap tuition in Arizona, which Haeger insists will force NAU to rely on its questionable state budget for support.
Wahl said the concept of a tuition cap is new and the idea would have to be approached with caution.
“I personally don’t ever see that happening, whether or not that would be a good idea I don’t really know,” Wahl said. “It might do more harm than good. If tuition was capped and the legislature didn’t fund the university it could be very detrimental to the value of education on campus.”
According to graphs presented by Haeger, 38 percent of the budget is derived from state appropriations, 24 percent from tuition and fees and 15 percent from government grants and contracts.
Wahl said this percentage is worrisome to ASNAU. He said Arizona legislature passed matching standards years ago that should provide two dollars of state appropriations for every dollar of student tuition, but the numbers have never quite met that standard.

This entry was posted on Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 12:29 pm and is filed under News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.