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Poshard: Obama ‘off base' on higher ed funding

THE SOUTHERN AND THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

CARBONDALE - President Barack Obama is off the mark if he plans on punishing universities that increase tuition with less federal funding, SIU's top official said Friday, the same day the president called for an overhaul of the higher education financial aid system.

SIU President Glenn Poshard, a former Democratic congressman, said he understands Obama's concern about ever-rising tuition costs at public universities, but students are feeling pinched because state funding for higher education is dwindling, especially in Illinois.

Speaking to students at the University of Michigan, Obama said he was "putting colleges on notice" that the era of unabated tuition hikes is over.

"You can't assume that you'll just jack up tuition every single year. If you can't stop tuition from going up, then the funding you get from taxpayers each year will go down," Obama said on the final stop of a three-day trip to promote components of his economic agenda.

Poshard took issue with the characterization.

"If the president is threatening a university because they've had to raise tuition in the face of declining state support, and universities are going to have to worry about federal funds being withdrawn because we're trying to keep our head above water," Poshard said. " I think the president is off base and doesn't understand the full issue."

SIU has taken huge cuts from the state to its operating budget in the last seven years, he added, to the tune of about $30 million.

Tuition rates have increased significantly in the same time period. In the fall of 2004, an in-state student with 30 credit hours paid $4,920 in tuition per year. By fall 2011 the cost had risen to $7,794, according to the university's website.

SIU has increased tuition six out of the last seven years at rates ranging from 4.5 to 15.9 percent. Illinois enacted truth in tuition laws in 2004, which keep tuition rates students pay as freshmen the same for four consecutive years.

It's unclear exactly how the federal government would make the determination a university's tuition rate was out of control, and that had many in the higher education community nationwide nervous.

Poshard said SIU Edwardsville's tuition rates are the lowest of any public university in Illinois, and the Carbondale campus' rates are lowest among the state's research universities. Officials on campus are currently working to determine what, if any, tuition increases will be necessary next fall, as the state has no plans to increase funding for higher ed operations in fiscal year 2013.

Obama's plan targets what is known as "campus based" aid given to colleges to distribute in areas such as Perkins loans or in work-study programs.

Of the $142 billion in federal grants and loans distributed in the last school year, about $3 billion went to these programs. His plan calls for increasing that type of aid to $10 billion annually.

He also wants to create a "Race to the Top" competition in higher education similar to the one his administration used on K-12 to encourage states to better use higher education dollars in exchange for $1 billion in prize dollars. A second competition called "First in the World" would encourage innovation to boost productivity on campuses.

Obama is also pushing for the creation of new tools to allow students to determine which colleges and universities have the best value.

SIU has been struggling the last few years. As state funding dries up and the Carbondale campus' student enrollment continues to falter, officials have kept many faculty and staff positions dark and cut other expenses.

"If the federal government wants to work with the state government in keeping higher education financed to the point where we don't have to worry about making all the cuts and not filling open positions, then that's a fair way to go," Poshard said.

"But to make a statement like that and not understand where the real problem exists seems to be a little unfair."