The funding plan announced this week by Gov. Bill Graves has focused attention on the need to raise funding for public schools, but that's only part of the state's education picture.
More funding clearly is needed for K-12 education in Kansas, but there also are urgent needs in the post-secondary system overseen by the Kansas Board of Regents. Those needs can't be overlooked as the Kansas Legislature heads into the home stretch of its 2001 session.
The plan the governor outlined to boost public school funding was an effort to correct a deficiency in his initial budget proposal. A similar effort is needed to help the six state universities.
The governor's budget included money that was promised in the Higher Education Coordination Act to fund pay raises for university faculty members, but that funding was more than offset by cuts elsewhere in the university budgets. The governor mandated a raise for the lowest-paid workers on the university payrolls, but added no funds to university budgets to pay for those raises.
Substandard raises also are slated for non-faculty workers, ranging from classified maintenance personnel to non-teaching administrators. The governor also reduced the state's commitment to high technology by eliminating state matching funds for a technology fee paid by students.
The Higher Education Coordination Act was primarily aimed at uniting the state's universities, community colleges and vocational-technical schools under the board of regents umbrella. A large part of the funding committed to implementing the act was directed not at improving post-secondary education in the state but at reducing the dependence of community colleges on local property taxes. Its focus was more on tax relief than education enrichment.
The only special funding for universities included in that plan was an allocation to provide raises for university faculty. Those raises are urgently needed but Kansas universities are so far behind their peer schools that the additional funding may not be enough to solve the problem.
Faculty salaries aren't the only pressing need universities face. Huge heating bills cut deeply into university resources this winter. Kansas University and Kansas State University have instituted hiring freezes to pay those bills. Raising faculty salaries is a positive step, but that can't be the only commitment the state shows to higher education. Without sufficient equipment and support staff, faculty members will find it difficult to teach, compete for grants and conduct research, all of which are important to a university's success and to retaining top faculty.
So, while it's wonderful that the plight of public schools has captured the governor's attention, the state can't afford to have tunnel vision. Those students who graduate from improved public schools also need good opportunities to continue their education in Kansas. What does the governor have in mind to provide the funding that is so urgently needed by Kansas Board of Regents institutions?
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