Week In Review

State Capitol Week in Review

LITTLE ROCK – Amendment 33 to the Arkansas Constitution grants a certain amount of independence to state colleges and universities.

A traditional interpretation of Amendment 33 is that it gives the legislature the power to appropriate tax revenue to colleges and universities, while the schools have authority over education policy.

There has been a lawsuit in which the extent of Amendment 33 was tested, but it did not result in a comprehensive ruling that clearly defined how much independence the amendment confers on institutions of higher education.

Amendment 33 is back in the spotlight, because of a legislative proposal that would start the process of repealing the sections of the amendment that pertain to higher education. The issue comes under focus at a time when most state-supported universities in Arkansas are raising tuition and fees again.

The university boards of trustees attribute the need for higher tuition to several factors, including inflation and enrollment growth. They say that state appropriations are not keeping pace with the rising cost of educating students, therefore they must raise tuition when state aid is lacking.

Because tuition and fees are going up, students and their families are taking on greater debt loads. As more families go into debt to pay for college, they are expressing their concerns to state legislators.

Legislators are being pressured by the public to hold down tuition, but they don't have the constitutional power to do so because of Amendment 33.

The legislature could increase state funding for colleges and universities, but that would require budget reductions of an equal amount in other areas of state government such as health care, prisons and social services.

And even if the legislature increased aid to universities, at the expense of other state services, there is no guarantee that universities would hold tuition at current levels. Amendment 33 allows college administrators to raise tuition and fees even when their institutions receive significant increases in state aid.

Creation of lottery scholarships should help make college more affordable, but tuition increases threaten to offset any benefits provided by the lottery scholarships. According to studies that is what happened in South Carolina, a state on which Arkansas modeled its lottery scholarship program.

Tuition increased so sharply that a college education in South Carolina is no more affordable now than it was before the lottery began. South Carolina legislators share some of the responsibility because for several years after the lottery began they allowed state aid for higher education to stagnate.

In the seven-year period between fiscal years 2001 and 2008, the legislature increased state funding of universities, on a per student basis, from $6,855 to $7,732. That is a total increase of 12.79 percent and an average yearly increase of 1.83 percent.

During the same period, Arkansas universities raised tuition and fees from an average of $3,503 to $5,187. That is a total increase of 48 percent and an average annual increase of 6.87 percent.

In spite of the increases in tuition and state funding, average faculty salaries in Arkansas remain the lowest of the 16 states in the Southern Regional Educational Board.