Florida House speaker probe now involves trustees, Miami Herald

January 28, 2009
By Alex Leary

TALLAHASSEE -- The college trustees who hired House Speaker Ray Sansom have become part of a criminal investigation into his dealings with the school over whether they violated the state's Sunshine Law, officials said Tuesday.

State Attorney Willie Meggs is investigating whether the Northwest Florida State College trustees violated state laws on public meetings for a gathering they held in Tallahassee last March.

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Despite cuts to Fla.'s state universities, private school tuition aid may rise, The Ledger (Lakeland)

January 25, 2009
By Joe Follick


TALLAHASSEE Even with Florida’s 11 public universities laying off staff and limiting enrollment, the state will spend more than $90 million this year to help residents attend private colleges.

The Florida Resident Access Grant program, better known as “FRAG,” was created in 1979. The goal was to keep Floridians who were considering out-of-state private schools and help provide options beyond public universities.

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Economic stimulus plan could mean $2-billion for Florida schools, St. Pete Times

January 23, 2009
By Ron Matus

The economic stimulus plan rolling through Congress could pump $2-billion into Florida schools, easing the pain from yet another round of state budget cuts on tap for this spring.

The $825-billion package, backed by President Obama, sets aside at least $100-billion for K-12 education and $21.5-billion for colleges and universities.

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UNF board plans for bad times, Times-Union (Jacksonville)

January 23, 2009
By Adam Aasen

With the anticipated next round of budget cuts weighing on their minds, University of North Florida administrators are trying to figure out how bad things might get. UNF’s Board of Trustees was presented several scenarios on Thursday. One was optimistic: It’s possible, although unlikely, the school could see about $3 million more than its preliminary budget, which could mean more professors being hired. And one wasn’t: A worst case would see a shortfall of at least $5 million that could lead to academic programs being eliminated. It depends on how much Legislature cuts in higher education and how by much tuition is increased. This month, legislators met in a special session and cut about 4 percent of the state university system’s current fiscal year budget. Many lawmakers are now worried that next year’s higher education budget might be up to 14 percent less than the current budget.

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Dallas irm to handle search for new chancellor of Florida universities, St. Pete Times

January 23, 2009
By Donna Winchester

TAMPA — The group that oversees Florida's 11 public universities voted unanimously Thursday to hire a Dallas search firm to aid in hiring a new chancellor for the state university system.

The 14-member committee selected the firm of R. William Funk & Associates to find a replacement for chancellor Mark Rosenberg, who announced his resignation in September.

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Law schools dealing with budget cuts, American Lawyer

January 19, 2009
By Karen Sloan

JoAnne Epps got the bad news in September.

Instead of an expected 1% budget increase, the dean of the Temple University James E. Beasley School of Law learned that she would need to cut about 2% of the budget for the current academic year. The reductions were necessary because the Pennsylvania government — facing a major budget shortfall — was preparing to cut funding to the university by more than 4%.

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Lawmakers trim 4% from university budgets, Tampa Tribune

January 17, 2009
By Lindsay Peterson

For universities and colleges across Florida, the bad times started two years ago. And like nearly everyone these days, higher education officials see their finances going from bad to worse.

This week, Florida lawmakers took 4 percent from the state's college and university budgets for 2008-09. That amounts to $93.5 million for the State University System's 11 institutions.

Add that to the $259 million lost since 2007 and fears of more cuts when the Legislature goes into its regular session this spring.

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Florida colleges face 4% budget cuts, fear more in spring, Tampa Tribune

January 14, 2009
By Lindsay Peterson

For universities and colleges across Florida, the bad times started two years ago. And like nearly everyone these days, higher education officials see their finances going from bad to worse.

This week, Florida lawmakers are expected to take 4 percent from the state's college and university budgets for 2008-09. That amounts to $93.5 million for the State University System's 11 institutions.

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Education cuts coming into focus, News Herald (Panama City)

January 10, 2009
By Chris Segal

TALLAHASSEE -- The working draft of a bill aimed at resolving the state's billiondollar budget deficit reduces perstudent funding through the Florida Education Finance Program by 2 percent but gives school district moreflexibilityinspendingearmarked funds, lawmakers said Friday.

State universities and community colleges also will be cut by 4 percent and public schools and Florida's voluntary pre-kindergarten program by 2 percent. The summer prekindergarten program, though, will take a bigger hit with two more students added to each class for a maximum of 12 per teacher.

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Florida budget session: Don't Cut Kids, Education First, The Ledger (Lakeland)

January 9, 2009


The only good thing that can be said about the Florida Legislature and its special session on the budget crunch will come at next Friday's scheduled adjournment: "Good riddance."AC = -->

We've already addressed the lack of leadership for this important session. Already in the session's first four days, what leadership there has been has been in the wrong direction.

On Monday, legislators decided to cut more than $600 million in state support for public schools. On Tuesday, budget committees moved the bills along. About $467 million would be cut from the kindergarten-through-12th-grade programs. Another $113 million would come from public universities; an additional $6.5 million from private ones.

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Schools to take a big hit in budget, The Ledger (Lakeland)

January 6, 2009
By Lloyd Dunkelberger

TALLAHASSEE Lawmakers are preparing to slash more than $600 million in state support for public schools, community colleges and universities as they move to fix a $2.3 billion hole in the state budget.

Although there are some minor differences in their bills, House and Senate budget committees on Tuesday moved ahead on measures in the special session that would cut:

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Higher Ed funding critical for Florida's future, Tampa Tribune

January 4, 2009

Florida lawmakers have an amazingly difficult task before them as they go to work in 2009. They must find drastic cuts to balance the state budget, or find revenue elsewhere. Most importantly, they must keep vital services while finding ways to cut the budget. One of the most important areas they have to trim involves our institutions of higher education, and so far they aren't doing so well.

According to a Palm Beach Post story, top researchers at our universities are pulling out and moving due to Florida's budget crisis. This means hundreds of millions of dollars in research grants, and all the revenue that such research brings to the state, are lost. Along with that lost money, we lose our best and brightest students to other universities where the best professors move to and take their grant money.

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Florida legislature about to chop budgets for education, other services, Miami Herald

January 3, 2009
By Steve Bousquet

TALLAHASSEE -- Florida legislators will start the new year in familiar fashion: by cutting aid to schools and other programs, borrowing money, skimming cash surpluses and hiking traffic and court fees to patch a $2.3 billion hole in a leaky state budget.

The special session that begins Monday will bring the third major round of cuts in 10 months and is the result of a prolonged nosedive in tax revenues caused by the recession-wracked real estate and credit markets.

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Cut Florida's universities and the whole state bleeds, Palm Beach Post

January 3, 2009
Editorial


When state lawmakers meet in a special session next week to take up Gov. Crist's proposal to close a $2.3 billion budget gap, public universities should be a sacred cow.

Gov. Crist is recommending a 2.1''percent cut to the university system, or $51 million. That's smaller than the $97''million, which represents the 4 percent holdback announced in June, that could be implemented. But we believe it should be zero percent.

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Low marks on higher education, St. Pete Times

December 28, 2008
By Donald R. Eastman IIIThe three-ring circus of politicians, higher education and declining tax revenues in Florida is certainly entertaining, but it obscures the real issues of quality and access and further diminishes the confidence of taxpayers that their dollars will be used effectively. Consider:

• The absence of a statewide strategy and an effective coordinating body for higher education — since the demise of the Board of Regents — has been destructive of both public confidence and efficient allocation of tax dollars. Florida has spent more money on studies of how to improve the higher education system — many of them, including the recent Pappas Report and the 2004 Florida Council of 100 Report, quite good — than it has on putting those plans into effect. The current "forums" being sponsored by a few elected officials and the Florida Chambers of Commerce are a wholly unnecessary exercise. There are already plenty of good plans lying around; choose one!

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Researchers leaving state and taking their grants, Palm Beach Post

By December 25, 2008
By Kimberly Miller

When a lead Florida State University researcher needed five faculty members last year to start a landmark center dedicated to studying autism, state budget cuts prevented the school from hiring the additional professors.

The Ohio State University, however, had the money, recruited the researcher - and his more than $1 million in federal grants - and in a few years could be reaping the benefits of an autism program that may bring $10 million annually to the school.

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Lawmakers cash in with campus jobs, Miami Herald

December 20, 2008
By Jennifer Liberto


TALLAHASSEE -- By taking a six-figure job at a state college, House Speaker Ray Sansom has focused attention on a pattern of behavior that has gone on largely unchecked for decades in Florida's higher education system.

Even in a time of bleak finances, with curbs on enrollment and spikes in tuition, nearly two dozen current and former legislators are employed throughout the system -- six at the University of South Florida alone, including the wife of a state senator.

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Study: $7.6B impact from UCF med school, Orlando Business Journal

December 19, 2008
By Melanie Stawicki Azam


The University of Central Florida College of Medicine would create more than 30,000 local jobs and have a 10-year economic impact of $7.6 billion, according to a study released Dec. 19 by the university.

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Higher-Education Leaders Press Congress for Chunk of Stimulus Funds, Washington Post

December 16, 2008
By Valerie Strauss

More than 40 higher-education leaders from across the country asked Congress today to commit 5 percent of any economic stimulus program to the nation's colleges and universities.

The educators, including University of Virginia President John Casteen III and Chancellor William E. Kirwan of the University System of Maryland, published an open letter in newspapers warning that state budget cuts have harmed the public educational enterprise that is at the heart of the nation's long-term security.

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To help state's universities, spread the money around, Palm Beach Post

December 16, 2008


There are two ways to look at University of Florida President Bernard Machen's decision to donate his $285,000 in bonuses to a scholarship fund.

The charitable way:

Dr. Machen has set a great example and put his own money where his rhetoric is. During his nearly five years running the state's flagship university, Dr. Machen has criticized Florida for offering too little scholarship help to poor students. The $285,000 will help young men and women who are the first in their family to attend college. Unlike the ex-chairman of Merrill Lynch bleating for his $10 million bonus after he ran the company into acquisition by Bank of America, Dr. Machen has put the institution before himself.

The less-charitable way:

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