By John Lyon
Arkansas News Bureau
LITTLE ROCK — The dollars Arkansas spends helping students attend college are not helping as much as they once did, higher education officials told a legislative panel today, prompting a lawmaker from Fort Smith to ask whether the state has too many colleges.
In the 1998-99 school year, Arkansas colleges received $8,221 per student in state funding, private gifts, tuition and fees, according to a report presented to the Higher Education Subcommittee of the Arkansas Legislative Council.
More than half of that amount, $5,064, came from state funds, according to the report, which did not include federal aid in its figures.
In the 2008-2009 school year, colleges received $11,065 per student, with $5,386 — less than half — coming from the state. Adjusting the numbers for inflation, colleges received $7,489 per student, with $3,645 coming from the state, said Stanley Williams, senior associate director of finance for the Department of Higher Education.
“That’s a 28 percent loss of purchasing power in a decade, even in spite of the tremendous tuition increases that we’ve had, and they have been tremendous. They’ve outpaced inflation in all of the sectors of the economy,” Williams said.
“And yet we have not kept pace … in terms of the funds we have for students. The students are paying more, but they’re really getting less,” he said.
Rep. Tracy Pennartz, D-Fort Smith, questioned whether the state’s dollars are being spread too thinly to too many institutions. She said the department may want to look at “the number of higher education institutions we even need in the state of Arkansas,” particularly with the increasing availability of online learning.
“Our Department of Higher Education may need to look at whether we’re ‘over-colleged’ in light of alternative 21st century methods of obtaining a college education,” she said.
Arkansas, a state with a population of 2.8 million, has 11 four-year and 22 two-year public colleges and universities.
The department’s director, Jim Purcell, said the question of efficiency is being addressed. State colleges and universities have been directed to eliminate degree programs that graduate low numbers of students, he said.
“We’ve asked the institutions to look at how they can become more efficient, more productive, by looking at their programs that they do well and determining which programs perhaps are passe in the current marketplace,” Purcell said.
“Is there any conditions under which you as the department director could recommend to the Legislature that they close a four-year institution?” Pennartz asked.
“No,” Purcell said.
Pennartz asked if the possibility is “out there.”
“It would be out there. It’s implausible to me,” he said.
Rep. Bill Abernathy, D-Mena, drew laughs from other lawmakers by commenting, “I guess if we look at closing down a four-year institution we’d go for seniority, and the last one that came aboard would voluntarily close.”
The most recent addition to Arkansas’ public four-year institutions is the University of Arkansas at Fort Smith in Pennartz’s district.
Pennartz said she didn’t hear Abernathy’s remark.
“Good,” Abernathy said, to more laughs.
