A simple majority vote is all the Tennessee Higher Education Commission needs to pass a proposal Thursday that would terminate state funding to Tennessee university athletic departments and developmental classes.
The proposal would also limit enrollment, raise admissions standards and make The University of Memphis and the University of Tennessee the only schools eligible for additional doctorate programs.
These are some of the measures included in the 11-part proposal THEC has crafted to combat shortfalls in the state budget for higher education next year.
“The question is, how can we offer quality education in face of fiscal disparity?” said THEC director of Academic Affairs, Brian Noland. “We just can’t be all things to all people right now.”
The proposal, which has taken a year to create, amounts to a $25 million cut from athletic departments across the state. The University of Tennessee is exempt because it is already an auxiliary enterprise. Noland said the $3.7 million the U of M athletic department receives from the state and student fees will be reallocated to The U of M’s general funding.
Noland said the proposal was helped shaped by questions like, “How can the state continue to fund the athletic department while the academic core is suffering.”
Remedial and development studies are in the same boat. By cutting state appropriations Tennessee developmental classes will lose $10 million. The University of Memphis developmental classes represent $1.14 million of that amount.
Noland said it is up to the affected departments to figure out how to compensate for the lack of incoming funds. Patsy Krech, interim director for the transitional academic studies department said they are in the process of creating a pilot program with Southwest Tennessee Community College to have them teach developmental programs on U of M’s campus. Also, they said they are planning to combine some developmental intermediate algebra classes with college algebra classes. Additionally, they said they hope to combine some of the developmental writing classes with the lower level English class required for general education.
Noland said the measure to make The U of M and UT the only schools able to apply for more doctoral programs was meant to maintain the strength of the doctoral programs currently available.
“We tried to think of how we could make our doctoral programs as exemplary as possible,” Noland said.
Noland said the measure that would limit enrollment would not affect The U of M, as the number of incoming students at The U of M has been stable for the past decade. The provision was mainly targeted at MTSU, UTC and Austin Peay, schools that have seen growth in the last few years.
As for admissions standards, Noland said the proposal recommends schools study their admissions requirements to see if they could cut costs in any way. He said The U of M has already begun that process.
Two other proposals would lift moratoriums on new degree programs and new off- campus learning centers. The latter proposal comes shortly after The U of M’s official application to open a new campus in Millington was filed.
Lastly, THEC wants to hire an outside consultant agency to review the state’s engineering and agriculture programs to see if they could be run more efficiently.
“We may have too many engineering programs,” Noland said. “For example, Georgia only has one.”
Engineering programs are available at five other schools besides The U of M.
Noland said all the commissioners are familiar with the proposal and the chances of it passing are favorable, although changes may be made. If passed, the proposal would go into effect fall of 2002.
