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New Leader Presses for Central Missouri State University Funds

Posted on: Tuesday, 25 October 2005, 00:00 CDT

By Mara Rose Williams, The Kansas City Star, Mo.

Oct. 23--If Missouri legislators make state funding of college education mandatory, then tuition costs will go down, said Central Missouri State University's new president, Aaron M. Podolefsky.

Podolefsky last week toured the university's programs in Independence, Lee's Summit, Kansas City and North Kansas City.

On Saturday, Podolesfsky -- former provost and vice president for academic affairs at the University of Northern Iowa -- was inaugurated as CMSU's 14th president at a ceremony in Warrensburg.

In a brief interview at Independence Center, where CMSU has an information desk and several billboards, Podolefsky said he planned to spend a lot of time with potential donors and in Jefferson City pushing for more money for the state's colleges and universities. He vowed to reduce tuition at the university if the state would increase aid above the rate of inflation.

The issue, he said, is critical to preventing public institutions, including CMSU, from leaning more on private funding and saving them from pricing out low-income, high-performing students. Those are the students who are hardest hit as state funding for higher education shrinks and tuition costs continue to rise, albeit at a slowing rate.

In a recent report on the cost of college education, the College Board, a nonprofit educational membership association, announced that the average in-state tuition and fees for undergraduate students at public four-year colleges and universities rose $365, or 7.1 percent, from the 2004-2005 to the 2005-2006 academic year, compared with $487, or 10.5 percent, the previous year. Last year tuition went up 4 percent at CMSU. About 1,900 of its 10,600 students are from the Kansas City area.

At the same time, education leaders across the country are warning that public higher education is sliding toward greater dependence on private funding because fewer dollars overall are coming from state and local taxes. The New York Times reported earlier this year that the share of all public universities' revenues derived from state and local taxes declined from 74 percent in 1991 to 64 percent in 2004.

Less than half -- 49 percent -- of CMSU's budget comes from state aid.

"I want CMSU to be a nationally recognized comprehensive university that delivers a world-class university education," Podolefsky said. "It strives to do that now, but we can do better."

Podolefsky said he wanted to see the university, despite having costly departments such as nursing and aviation, offer an even broader range of programs. He also wants to maintain personalized attention for students, "but with real professors, not teaching assistants," he said.

But the challenge, he said, is that "it is hard to improve quality without cost."

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Copyright (c) 2005, The Kansas City Star, Mo.

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Source: The Kansas City Star (Kansas City, Missouri)

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