economy
June 29, 2011
College Not Only ‘Worth it’, but a Key to Higher GDP and Lower Inequality
The Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce has released another report projecting an increasing need for college graduates in the US workforce. Like last year’s report, the new report, “The Undereducated American”, argues that there is an existing under-supply of college educated workers, evidenced by the very high college wage premium, and projects…
June 28, 2011
Oregon Institutions Gain Flexibility Alongside State Funding Cuts.
Last week, Oregon Legislators signed a state budget that, among other things, cut funding for public higher education by 17 percent. It is unknown whether this cut will necessitate tuition increases above those already approved earlier this month by the Oregon State Board of Higher Education, including an 8.8 percent increase at Oregon State University…
June 23, 2011
Are Public U Presidents Paying a Price for Seeking Change?
Recent news has some wondering whether unsuccessful attempts by some public flagship institutions to obtain greater autonomy from the state, and in some cases from a larger university system, have led to negative consequences for the university presidents pushing for the reforms. Having been strongly criticized by University of Wisconsin system officials and Chancellors for…
June 17, 2011
Projected 2011-13 State Revenue Takes a Dive
Yesterday, the Washington State Economic Revenue and Forecast Council released a troubling update for 2011-13 state general fund revenue. Overall, the over $730 million dollars held in reserve in the recently signed budget is now projected to be only $163 million. If this trend continues, mid-year and supplemental session cuts may be likely. Please see…
June 9, 2011
Improved Job Prospects For Recent College Graduates
As the New York Times reported in late May, hiring of recent college graduates is up five percent from last spring—encouraging news for UW students graduating in a few days’ time. The Seattle Times confirmed that this trend is followed in Washington State as well, with the unemployment rate falling from 9.2 percent in April…
June 3, 2011
Importance of Need-Based Aid for Achieving Attainment Goals
A recent Pell Institute Report proposed a new way to think about reaching President Obama’s goal of increasing the proportion of adults with a college degree to 60 percent by 2020. The Institute suggests that income inequality creates a two-tier educational system in which 25-34 year-olds in the top half of the income distribution have…
May 26, 2011
Pew Survey of College Presidents Highlights Divergent Views from General Public
Along with its survey of the general public, the Pew Center recently published a survey of 1,055 two- and four-year, public, private and for-profit college presidents, concerning the quality, accessibility, and affordability of higher education. The two surveys were conducted around the same time and asked similar questions. However, there were notable differences between the…
May 18, 2011
Recent Pew Survey on College Affordability and Quality Released
The Pew Research Center recently conducted a large telephone survey of 2,142 Americans to gauge opinions about higher education quality, affordability, and importance. While many respondents reported anxiety about affordability, most valued a college education highly and reported a belief that it would provide career benefits in the future. Some of the key findings of…
May 11, 2011
Legislature Authorizes Tuition Setting for WA Institutions
As of today, House Bill 1795 has passed both the Washington State House and Senate by wide margins and is on its way to the Governor. As outlined in our previous post, this bill gives Washington’s four year public institutions the ability to set resident undergraduate tuition rates, alongside new financial aid and accountability requirements,…
May 9, 2011
Tuition Setting
Friday, the Seattle Times published an article about a potential agreement between lawmakers to, given several years of steep funding cuts, allow Washington’s universities to set undergraduate resident tuition rates for a limited number of years and with new financial aid and accountability requirements. News of this agreement comes as the Legislature is in the…
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