Des Moines Register
05-29-06
Starving our universities?
The issue: Iowa’s Legislature is spending less on the three state universities this
year than it did nearly a decade ago. And next year’s operating-budget
appropriation is well below the schools’ request.
Meanwhile, as state support has shrunk as a share of expenditures, tuition has
climbed. That’s made it harder for the average Iowa family to afford higher
education. In 1980-81, state support was 77 percent of expenditures. Today it’s
49 percent. Tuition, meanwhile, funded 21 percent of expenditures in 1980-81,
but funds 44 percent now.
Today, the three presidents of the state universities discuss the impact of this
funding trend on their campuses. Next Monday, three legislative leaders will
discuss whether they believe funding is adequate to allow the state’s universities
to be top-quality teaching and research institutions.
What online readers are saying
• “I am a recent graduate of Iowa State University. I will be attending the
University of Iowa’s law school in the fall. While at ISU I received an excellent
education from faculty and administrators that truly put students first. I oppose
the $100 surcharge, yet I understand that the state of Iowa has given the
universities little choice. The time has come for Iowa to step up and support
higher education. Since 2000 tuition at Iowa State University has gone up 81
percent. Students graduating from Iowa State University have the second-highest
debt load in the country for public universities upon leaving college. If the state of
Iowa is serious about retaining young people in Iowa, and increasing our
economies, it only makes sense that we invest in our universities.”
• “100 bucks really isn’t that much. The little darlings may have to go on the
wagon for a week, but so what.”
• “I think our legislators know that increasing tuition will hurt a group of people
who don’t provide an organized opposition. I would encourage the youth of Iowa
to change this situation.”
• “The education system in Iowa is a great bargain. Borrow $200, get a job, or
whatever. Then after you graduate, help those who will be following you by
contributing to your alumni association.”
Research dollars key to growth of Iowa economy
I fully understand the difficult choices our elected leaders must make when they
allocate the state's limited resources to fund Iowa's many pressing and important
needs, and we appreciate the new one-time economic development and
infrastructure funding that was approved for Iowa State for FY2007.
I am, however, concerned that the university's general operating budget has
been so seriously eroded — through budget cuts from FY2001 to FY2005 and
lower-than-inflationary increases this year and next — that it is affecting our
ability to support Iowa when Iowa needs it most.
In today's global economy, knowledge is the single most important resource in
determining competitiveness. This makes Iowa's "knowledge generators" — our
public universities with their extensive research enterprises and baccalaureate
and graduate education programs — absolutely critical to Iowa's success.
If Iowa truly expects to compete successfully in this global economy, it is
imperative that Iowa's leaders recognize the importance of our public research
universities and ensure they are adequately supported. Regrettably, that has not
happened. The deterioration in public support over the past six years has put our
state appropriation at the same level it was in FY1998, in real dollars. This has
had a negative impact on all parts of the university, and especially on our most
important resource — our faculty.
Faculty members educate and prepare our students to be innovators and leaders
of our businesses, professions and communities. They provide educational and
technical assistance to Iowa businesses and lead our extensive research
enterprise, generating the knowledge that drives economic development.
Top faculty in areas critical to Iowa — agriculture, engineering, veterinary
medicine and science and technology — are in very high national demand
because their research is particularly relevant to economic development.
These faculty members are aggressively sought by universities all over the
nation, and the inadequate state funding we have experienced since FY2001 has
put us at a significant competitive disadvantage. We rank last in our group of
peer universities in faculty salaries.
Just this past year, more than a dozen of our most outstanding professors left us,
because weakened state support has caused a loss of competitiveness in
salaries and supporting infrastructure. Those losses include:
• Charles Brummer, professor of agronomy and a leading researcher in forage
breeding, plant genomics and bioenergy crops, to the University of Georgia.
• Dan Armstrong, professor of chemistry, holder of eight patents and an R&D 100
Award, and one of the most cited scientists in the world, to the University of
Texas, Arlington.
• Carolina Cruz-Neira, professor of industrial and manufacturing systems
technology, a pioneer in virtual reality technology and one of the key people in
building our Virtual Reality Applications Center into a world-class facility, to the
Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise, a new collaboration involving the
University of Louisiana.
Fortunately, we have been able to retain other heavily recruited faculty members
and even lure a few outstanding professors away from other universities. But the
longer our state funding fails to keep up with inflation, the more faculty we will
lose and the fewer top people we will be able to bring to ISU.
If the state of Iowa wants to have a top-flight university of science and technology
— one that can support and strengthen Iowa's economy and communities —
strong state support is essential.
GREGORY L. GEOFFROY is president of Iowa State University.