Florida's political assault on higher education

From the orlando Sentinel's editorial board

This year Florida lawmakers launched what former Gov. Bob Graham aptly described as "a political assault on higher education." How rough was it?

-Lawmakers passed a budget that would slash $300 million in funding for the state's 11 public universities, directing them to raid their reserves and ratcheting up pressure on them for another year of 15 percent tuition hikes.

-For the University of Florida and Florida State University, lawmakers eliminated the upper limit on raising tuition, creating the likelihood that students at those schools will have to swallow even higher annual hikes.

-Yet lawmakers also added to the financial stress on the system by caving to Senate budget chief J.D. Alexander's parochial crusade to create a 12th university, Florida Polytechnic University, from a University of South Florida branch with locations in and around his district. Groups representing USF students, faculty and alumni came out against the idea, but Alexander bullied colleagues into backing it.

Forcing universities to dip deep into their savings accounts to cover ongoing expenses will discourage them from being fiscally responsible and putting money aside in the future. Why bother, if lawmakers might use the reserves as an excuse to cut university funding again?

One of Wall Street's rating agencies,Moody's Investors Service, called the reserve raids a "credit negative" for the universities. That could raise their borrowing costs at a time when they can least afford it. Regardless, universities won't have as much money to improve their programs and facilities or recover from emergencies, such as hurricanes.

And counting on universities to raise tuition 15 percent — or more at Florida and FSU — would continue a pattern over the past five years in which lawmakers have shifted more and more of the burden of financing higher education to students and their families.

While tuition at Florida universities is still lower than the national average, the rapid rise in recent years — it has jumped for in-state undergraduates at the University of Central Florida by 40 percent since the 2007-08 academic year — has left many students deep in debt.

Graham has rightly called on Scott to block the budget cuts for higher education. There's a precedent: As governor, Graham vetoed the Legislature's budget for higher education in 1980.

Although students at Florida and FSU voted overwhelmingly against further tuition hikes, Scott shouldn't need much persuasion to veto the bill that would eliminate the cap on increases. He's on the record as opposed to tuition increases and committed to keeping the cost of living low in the state.

The Florida Polytechnic bill is another easy call for Scott to veto. The state's in no position to take on the cost of the administration and other extra overhead associated with a new university.

With these three vetoes, Scott could turn back this year's assault on higher education.

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2012-04-08/opinion/os-ed-higher-education-assault-040812-20120406_1_tuition-at-florida-universities-tuition-increases-tuition-hikes