News Release: Report on higher education calls for new compact between State and universities

Contact:
June West
313-567-8566

Investment, accountability and access to university education key components to State's economic competitiveness

LANSING, MICHIGAN—The University Investment Commission today released a comprehensive report on higher education that calls for a long-term strategy to meet the challenge of building economic security and social progress in Michigan.

Commission Chairman Paul Hillegonds said, “We must look beyond the current budget issues and find ways to make higher education available and affordable for more people in Michigan. The future growth of this state depends on our ability to remain competitive and that takes an educated workforce.”

Michigan lags behind the nation in the number of people holding college degrees. Nationally, 25% of the total population holds a four-year degree compared to Michigan's 23%. In addition, 45% of students entering Michigan's colleges and universities do not complete a bachelor's degree. The long- term impact is a workforce that lags behind more competitive states and a less attractive place for businesses to locate and grow.

The report proposes a new compact between the state and its public universities with shared responsibility for strengthening Michigan's lineup of world-class higher education institutions and achieving greater numbers of people with four-year degrees, especially in segments that are currently underrepresented in universities. The report also urges the new governor to convene a statewide summit of university, political, business, labor and civic leaders to assist in fashioning a long-term higher education development strategy.

Investment in higher education clearly pays off. The Michigan Economic Development Corporation found that the state's investment of $1.5 billion in higher education in 1999 produced a net economic impact of $39 billion or 12.6% of Michigan's gross state product. In addition, better-educated workers generally earn more and generate more taxes and consumer spending.

Report on higher education 2-2-2

Additional recommendations include:

• Building strong relationships between universities and K–12 schools to improve student's readiness for higher education.
• Annual State of Public Universities Message that reports on the collective progress in meeting a common set of objectives and provide reports on university efficiency and accountability measurements.
• Review routes to making higher education more affordable through increasing federal and other grants and low-interest loans to college students. A statewide survey of high school seniors and college students would be an important step towards developing new means of assistance or establishing that the current system is working well.
• Recognition that any higher education budget is comprised of both development and maintenance components and the emphasis needs to be on the development side. Dollars invested are returned to the economy, communities and families. When more African American men are incarcerated in prisons than enrolled in colleges and universities, the price of past investment choices is clear.
• Create a multi-year strategy to achieve aggregate per-student appropriations that at least meet the average of Great Lakes and competing states. Michigan's per-student average level of support is $5,795, nearly $1,000 less than the state's neighbors and competitors. Combining increased public support with institutional savings will go a long way towards restraining tuition increases, increasing quality and expanding accessibility.

The University Investment Commission was established in the spring of 2002 by the Presidents Council of State Universities to provide an outside review of public higher education in Michigan. The Commission is comprised of business, labor and other leaders and such groups have scrutinized Michigan's support of public universities roughly every decade. In 1994, Governor James Blanchard named a group headed by former U.S. Attorney James Robinson and in 1992 Federal Judge Damon Keith chaired a similar panel. The 2002 University Investment Commission is a non-partisan panel chaired by former Speaker of the Michigan House of Representatives Paul Hillegonds.