Panel backs revamping higher education funding

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — An Arkansas panel on Friday recommended tying higher education funding to factors such as degree completion, a move that supporters say will help make the case that the state's colleges and universities need more money.

The Arkansas Higher Education Coordinating Board adopted the framework for a new "outcomes-based" funding plan. Currently, most of the state's higher education funding formula is tied to student enrollment.

The plan adopted Friday calls for funding to be linked to factors such as number of students completing degrees, how many graduates get a job or another degree, and how long it takes a student to graduate. Lawmakers must approve the framework before the board finalizes the funding formula, which would include details on how the factors would affect funding levels.

"It's about student success," state Higher Education Director Brett Powell told the board before it approved the plan. "If you care about students, outcomes-based funding will help us get to the student success we all want."

Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson last year called for overhauling the higher education funding formula and praised the plan adopted Friday.

"These changes will promote efficiency of operations, encourage on-time completion, and encourage allocation of resources to areas which directly impact student success, such as faculty salaries and academic support services," Hutchinson said in a statement released by his office. "My priority continues to be increasing the percentage of Arkansans that are career-ready, equipped with degrees and industry-recognized certificates, and this new revolutionary funding model will help us achieve just that."

The board also called on the Legislature to increase funding for higher education, which has remained flat for the past several years. The state's colleges and universities received about $733 million in the $5.3 billion state budget that was approved earlier this year. Higher education officials said the new formula, if approved by lawmakers, would be used in the funding recommendations that would go before the Legislature in 2018.

"It is our responsibility to stand up for higher education and say, 'We're taking these steps, but we just absolutely must have additional funding,' for not only the benefit of the state and the institutions, but, most of all, for the students of the state," Ben Pickard, a member of the board, said.