This from Diverse Issues in Higher Education:
A proposal by the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education would link performance by Kentucky's public universities to extra state funding. The plan, put forth Thursday, is part of an effort to boost Kentucky's low national rankings in educational attainment. The council will include it in a $2.4 billion budget request for the next biennium, which begins July 1.
The council's senior vice president for budget policy, John Hayek, said the measure will put pressure on institutions to improve.“I think that is what the state wants from its investment,” Hayek said. “I think most taxpayers would want us channeling funds to institutions that are helping students graduate.” University of Kentucky Provost Kumble Subbaswamy told The Courier-Journal that the school welcomes the accountability sought by the measure (http://cjky.it/t6avbg ).
It would establish performance-based standards for allocating tax dollars to state universities a strategy that officials hope to expand in the future. The council plans to finalize details of the program in February. In general, it would set aside $25 million in state funds during the second year of the biennium for the public universities and the Kentucky Community and Technical College System.
Universities would receive money from the fund based on how well they improve graduation rates and degree production. They also would be called on to close the achievement gap for underprepared students and raise the number of student transfers from the community and technical college system to the four-year universities. The new funding totals about 2.5 percent of the state's annual appropriation to public universities, which Hayek said is enough to get attention without creating financial instability...
1 comment:
Graduation is the end result of learning and academic performance not a condition in itself.
This is not going anywhere for the simple fact that college level instructors have such a broad latitude in most cases regarding curriculum selection, instructional approach and assessment. Responsibility for learning is placed squarely on the adult learner and not the other way around as in the case with public schools where it is the teacher's responsibility that students learn.
Another reason this isn't going to float is because higher ed leadeship lacks the ability to significantly influence this expectation. University professional culture is significantly different from that of public schools. Additionally, teaching is often a responsibility which gets the least emphasis when compared to expectations of scholarly production, grant writing and service.
Additionally, is if fair to bring preasure to bear on progams which are more rigorous and selective because their students are not successful due to challenging nature of the content?
Understand that I am not knocking college instructors, it is simply a different culture which is not going to be responsive to these types of expectations. As a tenured college instructor who is not going to be a benefactor of any additional funding to the institution why would I feel obliged to alter my pedagogy if student success was not already an instrinsic value for me?
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