The Coordinating Commission for Postsecondary Education provides funding and priority recommendations for Nebraska State College, University of Nebraska, and Nebraska College of Technical Agriculture at Curtis (NCTA) capital construction budget requests, as outlined in Nebraska's Constitution and Statutes. The overarching principle used in this…

Nebraska's constitution and state statutes require the Coordinating Commission for Postsecondary Education (CCPE) to review the budget requests of the University of Nebraska, the Nebraska State College System, and the community colleges in light of specific criteria set forth in the statutes. The Commission also makes recommendations on major…

California had a long tradition of very low tuition for students enrolled in public higher education. The state broke with that policy in the 2000s, when recessions resulted in significant cuts to state funding for public colleges and universities--the University of California (UC), California State University (CSU), and California's community…

Many states are passing "free" college plans, and policymakers at both the state and federal level continue to debate the merits of national "free college" or "debt-free college" proposals, also known as Promise programs. Both federal and state "free" college proposals are geared toward a policy objective of…

Universities are undergoing historic change, from the sharp downward shift in government funding to widespread demands to document performance. At the University of California Berkeley, this led to an operational change effort unlike any the university had ever attempted, dubbed Operational Excellence. The authors describe their experiences…

A major headline in recent years has been that cash-strapped state governments are cutting back support for many services, including public higher education. Oklahoma is no different. Indeed, in the most recent state budget crafted by Oklahoma policymakers, Oklahoma's public colleges and universities received a 5.8 percent cut in state…

The lingering economic downturn has affected virtually every American institution--perhaps none more significantly than the nation's higher education system. These days, facing significant revenue shortfalls that are widely recognized as the "new normal," state-supported colleges and universities are looking, sometimes desperately, for…

The tuition increase at the University of Florida--one of 11 public universities in Florida to win the approval of the state's Board of Governors to tack a "tuition differential" of 7 percent onto an 8 percent increase already approved by the state legislature--comes in response to an unprecedented reduction of some $340 million in state…

Maryland's governor, Martin J. O'Malley, didn't get much of his legislative agenda through the General Assembly this year, but he did succeed on one front: preserving enough state aid for the public-university system to stave off a tuition increase for the fourth consecutive year. Like politicians in several states, Mr. O'Malley, a Democrat, made…

With the failure of most of the May 19 ballot measures, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has released additional proposed revisions to the current year (2008-09) and budget year (2009-10) state spending plans. The Governor and Legislature adopted an 18-month spending plan in late February, but that budget now has a $24 billion deficit. The…

The public higher education systems have received significant budget cuts in the 2009-10 fiscal year, with the University of California (UC) receiving $813 million less than in 2007-08, California State University (CSU) receiving $625 million less, and the community college system receiving $812 million less. It is important to understand the…

As with past practice, publishing this set of guidelines officially launches the higher education capital planning and budgeting process for fiscal years 2009-2014. The guidelines include a schedule, definitions, planning assumptions, statewide considerations, and instructions for presenting a six year capital plan. Contents include: (1)…

On July 28, the Governor signed legislation making significant revisions to the 2009-10 state budget. The revised budget allocates $85 billion in State General Fund spending, down from the $92 billion in the budget approved by the Governor and Legislature in February. This budget revision also captures some savings from the just-completed 2008-09…

This report presents the recommendations of the Alabama Commission on Higher Education concerning funding for public colleges and universities in the state for 1998-99. Two recommendations are provided by the commission. The first recommendation is a statement of the Commission's estimate of the financial requirements needed to support the…

This is the final report of the Financial Plan Project for Colleges and Universities. Its primary purpose is to present proposals on a financial plan for Alberta universities and public colleges. Following a brief review of financing postsecondary education in Canada, it focuses on the last ten years of Alberta practice; the treatment is…