After a day of extensive cuts to K-12 and higher education, universities and public school districts face the daunting task of limiting the negative effects the governor’s cuts will have on providing quality education across the state.
Gov. Bob Taft cut instructional aid for state universities by $39.2 million yesterday. Ohio State’s share of the losses is roughly $7.7 million. This brings the total loss to more than $313 million to Ohio higher education over the last three fiscal years.
OSU President Karen A. Holbrook said the school is prepared to do its best in light of the loss of appropriations.
“We need to focus on how we can continue to perform at a high level, despite the loss,” Holbrook said. “We have already contacted our departments, preparing them for potential cuts.”
According to the OSU office of Business and Finance, a reduction of $7.7 million would be the equivalent of 1,700 lost class sections or 1,407 full scholarships for Ohio residents.
During his press conference, Taft implored university trustees not to impose a mid-year tuition increase. OSU has stated repeatedly that a tuition increase would be a last resort reaction to executive cuts.
Trustees at the University of Akron approved a 9.9 percent mid-year tuition increase last week, citing the budget difficulties.
“This action is a direct response to continued actions by the state to cut the budgets for colleges and universities,” said Akron University President Luis M. Proenza. “Any way you look at it, this amounts to a tax shifting to our students and families because Ohio has progressively reduced support for higher education over the past 30 years.”
Roderick G.W. Chu, chancellor of the Ohio Board of Regents, said it is unfortunate policy makers were not able to provide adequate resources to higher education.
“The sum of these actions will make it much harder for Ohio’s economy to rebound and become competitive with the nation’s leaders,” Chu said.
At Kent State, officials are pondering the impact of their $2.2 million loss.
“In our effort to optimize essential areas of education and the quality of our programs, layoffs are an unfortunate reality,” said spokesman Ron Kirksey.
Columbus State finds itself in an interesting position. Its funding was cut $1 million, but expects to see increased enrollment because of OSU’s cuts.
“We know our students are price sensitive,” said spokesman Pieter Wykoff. “Our challenge, like many other universities, is to keep front line personnel, while providing top quality education.”
State aid to primary and secondary school districts were cut $90.6 million as part of the governor’s efforts to balance budget.
William Phillis, executive director of the Ohio Coalition for Equity and Adequacy of School Funding said the 2.5 percent cut is unconscionable.
“This goes to prove that the legislation and other government officials have little regard for children or for a constitutional method of school funding,” Phillis said. “Students only attend high primary and secondary schools once; these types of cuts will have life long consequences for our state’s children.”
