Universities cry out; is anybody listening?
By A TIMES EDITORIAL
Published June 19, 2007
Florida State University president T.K. Wetherell may have played his cards close to the vest in his days as House speaker, but he ain't bluffing now. The enrollment freeze he has ordered for next fall is only the first of more to come in a university system that is $120-million in the hole and counting.
"You can't keep taking more students and getting less money, " Wetherell told reporters, "and provide the students with the quality education the students want. Something's got to give, guys."
This is no manufactured crisis. It is simple math. Tuition pays only a fourth of the cost of a university education, and the Legislature has been balancing its budget in recent years by pretending the other three-fourths are free. They are not.
Just look around. University of Florida president Bernie Machen has tried, with no success, to win authority for an academic enhancement fee or tuition increase and is now looking at a potential hiring and enrollment freeze. University of South Florida vice provost Ralph Wilcox says lecture classes are being held in movie theaters, and chemistry labs can't keep pace even as they operate from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. He says USF may consider delaying admission decisions next year until after the Legislature approves the university appropriations. Says Wilcox: "We're at the breaking point now."
Gov. Charlie Crist hasn't helped matters with his veto of a 5 percent increase in what ranks as the nation's lowest tuitions, or his threatened veto of a tuition differential for the three major research institutions. But the problem is a much broader and enduring neglect and a new Legislature that has suddenly created a $7.1-billion deficit for public schools. Whether that hole can be plugged is far from certain. But if past history is any guide, universities will lose out in the exchange.
All this may help to explain why the current chairwoman of the university system Board of Governors, Carolyn Roberts, has issued a passionate plea to her own colleagues (see column on opposite page). Roberts, an Ocala Realtor who has served under three Republican governors and is known for her Southern grace, sounds ready to remove the gloves.
"Since I have been associated with higher education and our universities, we have continually shortchanged public university funding, " Roberts says. "Access is on the cheap, and we have kept our doors open. Perhaps we are in this situation today - too many expectations, and bare-bones funding for access - in part because we accommodated and did not draw a line."
Gov. Crist and legislative leaders want taxpayers to think that lunch is free, but that's not the way a university can operate. At FSU, the bills have to be paid and next year high school seniors will have 1, 800 fewer chances to gain admission. This is what happens when higher education becomes an orphan in its own state.