Higher Education Takes a Dive (or a dump...)

Welcome to your first SEEdebate assignment. As you know, the state of Nevada has some HUGE budget problems. Read the following 2 articles and answer these questions in complete, thoughtful and appropriate language. Check spelling, grammar, punctuation and proper use of capital letters AND read what you write so it makes SENSE!!

DUE ON FRIDAY FEBRUARY 12 (yes, it is only 8 days BUT then you have the 3 day weekend FREE!!)

1. What proposal would you present to the governor and our legislature to solve this budget problem? Think about the entire state and all the industries in Nevada.

2. Is everyone doing their fair share? Would you consider raising taxes, if so how much and for who?

3. Considering what could happen to our college system, how might this impact your future plans? As a senior? Or a junior?

4. Will your family or any friends be impacted by these proposals, how?

5. Any additional comments you want to make regarding THIS issue.
ARTICLE 1
HIGHER EDUCATION:
Regents’ options to cut higher education are all grim
Closing colleges, wiping out athletics among ways to slice millions in costs

By Emily Richmond (contact)
Wednesday, Feb. 3, 2010 | 2 a.m. Las Vegas Sun

This is how bad the news is getting for Nevada’s already-pummeled higher education system.
To absorb an immediate reduction in state funding of $37 million and the loss of another $110 million in the next fiscal year, the Nevada System of Higher Education Board of Regents on Tuesday was presented with an almost unfathomable choice of options:
• Close Nevada State College and the College of Southern Nevada.
• Close the Boyd School of Law, UNLV’s School of Medicine, UNLV’s dental school, the Desert Research Institute, Great Basin College and Truckee Meadows Community College.
• Eliminate UNR and UNLV athletics and the Agricultural Experiment Station at UNR and close Nevada State College, Great Basin College, Truckee Meadows Community College and Western Nevada College.
• Cut everyone’s pay, systemwide, by 20 percent.
• Force all employees to take off another five days per month without pay.
• Lay off 1,290 employees and decrease enrollment by 15,570 students, a 14 percent drop from 2009 enrollment.
The staggering options stem from the latest estimates of how much money is coming to the state — it’s still dropping — and how higher education can shoulder its share of cutbacks.
Chancellor Don Klaich told regents the options represent an “unwinding of almost a decade of significant progress in higher education.”
“Make no mistake,” he said. “Higher education in Nevada is changing, and not for the better.
“We will lose our competitive edge ... and add to the already crushing burden of unemployment in this state,” Klaich said. “We will lose the ability to train the workforce for the very economy we wish to attract to this state.”
Klaich said he has met with presidents of the colleges and universities this winter and has been encouraging them to prepare reports outlining the effect of budget cuts of 8 percent, which was what was considered a reasonable estimate at the time of what the governor would be asking of higher ed.
But then the Economic Forum met Jan. 22 and concluded that the state was hurting even more. “I think our collective breath was taken away, and our planning to date became moot on that terrible Friday afternoon,” Klaich told the regents.
At the regents meeting — which drew such a large audience at the College of Southern Nevada’s West Charleston campus that an overflow room was used — the board weighed the prospect of declaring a financial exigency, meaning there’s not enough money to meet expenditures. Doing so would give individual college and university presidents more leeway in cutting staff and programs.
The regents can only vote on such action after a recommendation from the chancellor with input from the council of campus presidents. Klaich said although it’s important for the regents to be aware of the size of the financial crisis, and the possible responses, a decision can wait until the March meeting, after lawmakers have met in a special session and higher ed’s funding levels are more clear.
UNR President Milton Glick said to his knowledge Nevada would be the first higher education system in the nation to be forced to take such drastic measures and would become the case study for fiscal failure in academia.
“We would be the poster child,” Glick said. “That’s a terrible burden.”
CSN is feeling the effects of budget cuts in ways big and small — with forced days off, crowded classrooms, added work assignments and, in student Maria Carrillo’s Astronomy 101 class, reliance on an overhead projector because there’s not enough money for class handouts.
Of more concern to her, Carrillo said, is the prospect of fewer classroom seats. “It’s going to get more competitive,” said Carrillo, who wants to study criminal justice and become a prosecutor. “We’re not only going to have to compete against other people who want to go to college, we’re going to compete against the students who are already here and are trying to stay.”

ARTICLE 2
Governor’s staff proposes $328 million in budget cuts
Plan would cut funding for school districts and higher education by 10 percent each
By David McGrath Schwartz (contact)
Wednesday, Feb. 3, 2010 | 8:04 p.m.
Las Vegas Sun
CARSON CITY — Gov. Jim Gibbons’ senior staff released recommendations Wednesday evening to eliminate 235 jobs, close Nevada State Prison, and cut funding for school districts and higher education by 10 percent each.
The recommended budget cuts would also impact services to the poor, elderly and mentally disabled.
In total, the cuts would save about $328 million, according to a spread sheet. When other cuts are included, the plan results in about $418 million in reductions, according to Gibbons’ chief of staff, Robin Reedy.
That’s a far cry from the $881 million required to balance the budget. But it provides the first specific details about how the governor would make those cuts.
Gibbons’ senior staff presented the proposed cuts to lawmakers on Wednesday during a three-hour meeting.
Democratic lawmakers seemed to acknowledge the plan’s merit, and would not dismiss any specific portion of it as unworkable.
“The list contains many things no one wants to see happen,” said Assembly Speaker Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas. “My guess is that many of the things will happen.”
“It’s a start,” said Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford, D-Las Vegas. “These are all very, very ugly options. But they’re the types of things we hoped we’d see. It’s far from meeting the $881 million shortfall, so we have a ways to go.”
Both Horsford and Buckley said lawmakers would spend tonight reviewing the cuts and preparing questions for the administration when they meet again at 7 a.m. on Thursday.
Reedy and Deputy Chief of Staff Lynn Hettrick said they did not want to say yet how the rest of the shortfall could be addressed.
Hettrick said they were still researching some ideas to see if they are legal or would generate revenue in time. Hettrick repeated that there would be no tax increases.
Among the items included in the governor’s presentation:
• Close Nevada State Prison in Carson City, eliminating 136 jobs.
• Reduce funding to school districts by about 10 percent, or $166 million.
• Lay off 27 people at the gaming control board, which regulates gaming.
• Cut hospital reimbursement rates by 5 percent, saving $6.2 million in state money and $9.2 million in federal money.
• Cuts to personal care services, including clinical screening for new clients and limits on incontinence supplies and medical glove coverage for providers.
• Reduce placements for the homeless mentally ill in housing by 142, resulting in more mentally ill on the street and in emergency rooms, but saving the state general fund about $4 million.
• A 10 percent cut, or $6 million, passed down to Clark County’s Department of Family Services, which provides foster care and child protective services to children.