Higher education leaders often cite state disinvestment as one of the main problems plaguing their institutions. And it’s true, state governments have allocated less resources to colleges and universities after the Great Recession in 2008.
But state investment alone, while crucial, isn’t enough to make higher education accessible, according to a new report by Ithaka S+R, a higher education consulting company. The brief advocates for states to create strategic plans for three financial factors – appropriations, tuition and financial aid – to better support underrepresented students. Each one is a facet of affordability, it argues, so when the three aren’t aligned and considered together in a state-specific context, that leads to inefficient funding.
“States really need to think about aligning all of their various funding policies in order to maximize the impact of this funding and maximize the state dollars that are going into higher education to really improve outcomes for students,” said Ithaka S+R researcher Dr. James Dean Ward, an author of the report.
The report is part of a two-year grant project funded by the Joyce Foundation to explore state policy’s impact on access to higher education. Now a year into the project, Ithaka S+R will continue to come out with reports and case studies in the coming year. The intended audience is state lawmakers, as well as university leaders and advocacy groups who can put pressure on state leaders.
While its not the first report on what state investment in higher education should look like, Ward said, the brief tries to fill “a gap in the literature” in a “thoughtful way.”
“Funding and financing at the state level are not static issues,” he said. “They evolve over time as policy evolves and the contexts in which colleges are existing.”
The brief brings together research to highlight the ways in which appropriations, tuition and financial aid affect underserved students, both separately and together. Among other issues, it points out that lowering appropriations, the funds that go directly from state governments to public universities, leads to higher tuitions. Higher tuitions can deter low-income students from applying.
