Report: Are Wisconsin colleges falling behind?
A new report on the financial health of Wisconsin’s state universities and technical colleges found lagging state investment, enrollment challenges and — for University of Wisconsin schools — an ongoing tuition freeze as some of several factors threatening their competitiveness.
The Wisconsin Policy Forum, a statewide nonpartisan, independent policy research organization, released the report Tuesday.
“When you look at state funding, when you look at the tuition freeze, when you look at the enrollment trends, each of those things individually ... has been on a concerning trend in Wisconsin versus the rest of the country,” said Jason Stein, the policy forum’s research director.
“And then when you add the pandemic to that, I think there’s reason to be concerned and thoughtful about how to move forward and not take it for granted that we’re always going to have a world-class higher education system and flagship university,” he said.
The financial challenges faced by the universities and colleges have only been exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, the authors found, with the worst estimated losses coming from UW-Madison, where administrators predict a $320 million budget impact in 2020 and 2021 when considering costs and losses.
But the colleges’ woes began well before the pandemic hit.
Wisconsin has lagged behind Illinois, Iowa, Michigan and Minnesota for about two decades in the amount of state and local funding and net tuition revenue it receives per student, data from the report shows.
Between 2000 and 2019, the amount of state and local funding for each fulltime-equivalent student at the state’s universities and technical colleges fell from 6.4% above the national average to 16.5% below it, according to the report.
As recently as 2010, state tax dollars made up UW campuses’ largest source of UW System revenue, but tuition and federal money now contribute more, as families take on more of the cost of sending their children to college than generations past.
Technical colleges also have seen declining state aid since 2000, and property tax increases have been limited by the state.
At UW campuses, in-state tuition has been frozen since 2013. Campuses have kept costs for families down, but state funding has not filled the gap in the rising cost of educating students.
Meanwhile, the tuition reserve funds held by UW universities that prompted outrage from state legislators, and ultimately the tuition freeze, have decreased by nearly 60% between June 2013 and June 2020 — from $551.5 million to $227.3 million, the lowest point since 2008.
The spending down of unrestricted reserves likely helped prevent increased costs for students and taxpayers, the report’s authors write but also may have left the system less prepared for the pandemic.
All this while enrollment has been on the decline. Though not a record low, the number of full-time-equivalent students at UW schools fell by 8.4% since a peak in 2010. Not every UW school saw declines: UW-Madison, for example, increased enrollment, but not as quickly as its peers.
Two-year campuses saw the largest enrollment declines.
In Wisconsin’s technical colleges, full-time-equivalent student enrollment was down 22.5% from a 2011 peak, though technical colleges enroll far more part-time students than UW schools. The campuses that formerly made up the UW Colleges saw a more than 40% decline in enrollment between 2011 and 2019.
An array of options
While the report’s authors did not advocate for any particular response to the challenges, the report outlined various options for consideration by policymakers and college leaders. Those included:
Giving universities and/or the UW System’s Board of Regents more autonomy, including the ability to issue debt and set tuition.
Increasing state funding (UW System is requesting $133.5 million more in state funding in the next budget cycle and the technical college system is requesting $24 million more).
Changing the tuition freeze for UW schools to allow colleges to increase tuition or to provide more state support to fund frozen tuition.
Increasing online education, options for transfer students and efforts to diversify campuses to address enrollment declines.
Restructuring programs or closing campuses with low enrollment.
The report also acknowledged
Wisconsin campuses have seen successes despite the challenges they face.
The state’s six-year graduation rate rose from 58% in 2000 to 65.4% in 2013. Graduation rates also rose for underrepresented minority students. However, four-year graduation rates were lower than neighboring Iowa, Minnesota and Michigan, the forum found.
Students are also having to take fewer credits to graduate and the average debt held by bachelors’ degree recipients dropped from $32,823 in 2014 (adjusted for inflation) to $30,034 in 2019.
State higher education leaders weighed in on the report, welcoming the forum’s insights as budget discussions ramp up.
“I welcome public discussion and reports like this, which raises a number of important issues related to maintaining a strong system of higher education in the state,” said UW-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank. “I hope that policymakers will consider these issues as they construct and deliberate over the upcoming biennial budget. We share with all UW campuses in Wisconsin the goal of providing Wisconsin high school graduates the best value for their education dollar.”
Echoing several of the report’s conclusions, UW System Interim President Tommy Thompson said in a statement that he is seeking “targeted investment and flexibility” in his upcoming budget that will help the system become stronger in the wake of the pandemic.
Morna Foy, president of the Wisconsin Technical College System, said the report highlights the need to have “consistent, high-quality transfer opportunities” for students.