CARROLL: Higher ed guesswork
By Vincent Carroll, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)
Published June 25, 2008 at 12:05 a.m.
Colorado's higher ed czar, David Skaggs, last week pledged that his staff will be slaving over the summer to flesh out rules for the governor's proposed Colorado Promise Scholarships. After all, the governor's ballot initiative is notoriously vague about the specifics of who would be eligible for a scholarship, let alone for how much. Somebody ought to tell Coloradans what they'll be voting on this fall.
Unfortunately, the time to provide such details has passed. Government agencies are barred from spending public money to influence the fate of a ballot initiative. If the Colorado Commission on Higher Education, which Skaggs directs, draws up rules for the scholarships that help the measure pass, as they very likely would, then that work would amount to an "in-kind" campaign contribution.
To be sure, voters will hunger for clarity as the election approaches. Will a single child in a household earning $65,000 who attends Colorado State University qualify for a scholarship? What about a part-time student at Adams State in a family with a $50,000 income? After a Rocky editorial worried about the ballot measure's fuzzy language, Skaggs wrote last week assuring the public that draft guidelines will "answer very specific questions about the proposed scholarships" as well as provide "a reasonably complete understanding of how the scholarships will be administered if the ballot measure passes."
Trouble is, it's hard to imagine how such information won't boost the prospects of the initiative - a measure, let us not forget, that is the brainchild of Skaggs' own boss.
Former Republican state Sen. Mark Hillman is so concerned about a potential misuse of government workers that he's filed an open records request for communications between the governor's office and Skaggs' department.
Skaggs is a low-key, thoughtful fellow whom I've known for many years, so I asked him Monday what's going on. He conceded that releasing scholarship guidelines might affect some voters' opinion of the amendment, but he cited three reasons to move ahead.
First, he said, the higher ed commission is free to take a position for or against the ballot measure (absolutely true); his staff is free to answer questions of a factual nature from the public regarding an initiative (equally true); and finally, if his agency waits until after the election to formulate scholarship rules, it might not have time to finish the work before February, when colleges put together their financial packages for students entering in the fall.
I sympathize with Skaggs' dilemma: He can set his agency to work now and risk violating the law or wait until November and, if the measure passes, risk running afoul of the new law's 2009 timetable.
At the moment, however, the initiative isn't even on the ballot, let alone approved by voters. The only law that counts is the one that orders government agencies to steer clear of electioneering.
Yes, it would have been nice for Coloradans to know before they went to the polls who will actually benefit from the governor's plan. Yet it appears they'll just have to cross their fingers - at least if they're inclined to vote yes.
Reach Vincent Carroll at carrollv@RockyMountainNews.com.
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June 25, 2008
8 a.m.
Suggest removal
Mike_In_Hartsel writes:
Why are we raising taxes so more kids can attend school free? There's no requirement that higher education be tax-payer funded. All Ritter wants to do is buy his way to the White House.
June 25, 2008
9:50 a.m.
Suggest removal
olsonmt writes:
Mike, the White House? Seriously!? Ritter is lucky to have the job he has. Ritter, fully vetted by the real press, wouldn't survive long enough for a cup of coffee in a national campaign. The agricultural-trespass scandal alone will sink this dim rising star.
June 25, 2008
12:31 p.m.
Suggest removal
catlady writes:
Why, oh why does Higher Ed need to pick my pocket yet again? I paid for my own college already and I have just now paid off the last of my student loans.
Just look at the Fat Cat salaries of the folks employed at the Colorado Department of Higher Education and its progeny CU, CSU, UNC, etc and it is not hard to see why they are asking us to foot yet another bill. The whole of the regular State Employee system has but one individual (Ned Calonge) earning more than 200K. CU alone has dozens and dozens and dozens of employees earning more than 200k a year.
And even the salaries of the burrecrats at CDHE are very high. (and check the neopotism in this system, unreal)
CDHE you don't need my money, you need to do a whole sale reclassification of salaries and an evaluation of spending to get your budget in order. Spend less...don't tax more.
June 25, 2008
1:45 p.m.
Suggest removal
BetterEducated writes:
Very well stated.
June 25, 2008
4:32 p.m.
Suggest removal
mikeyg writes:
Higher education costs have radically gone up because of all the radicals in higher ed today. Do you think Ward Churchill was the only nutcase teaching at our institutions making $200k+/year? He just happened to be the only one outed.
What happens is these universities get into bidding wars for each other's most radical, most inflamatory, most notorious "professors" and they pass this cost on. Churchill got his extraordinary tenure offer outside the rules governing tenure for this very reason, CU was "afraid to lose him". Go figure.
If CU, CSU, et al want to find savings they can start hiring real professors, professors commited to teaching students facts and critical thinking methods without hardcore indoctrination and hatred towards this nation and "their enemies: conservatives and Republicans". I mean, chemistry students get anti-Bush screeds from their professors at CU in chemistry classes that have nothing to do with politics. Yet, these kinds of "professors" are rewarded with excessive salaries by their radical piers who are department heads.
But nobody is challenging this major cost driver of a college education. I say, let the universities continue to gouge their customers, students, until students say they aren't willing to pay them anymore unless they change their product to something that more closely resembles a sound college education, not a four-year radical liberal indoctrination camp. Let students (the custumers) go out of state to find better values and better education providers until they do.
Don't force taxpayers, including the businesses this tax primarily falls on, to subsidize a failed higher education model. And hold the Department accountable, as Vince writes, to the prohibition on electioneering. They'll sugar coat everything to appear as tasty to the voting public as they can - all just to continue the status quo and keep themselves and their radical friends employed at inflated and often unearned wages.
June 25, 2008
4:37 p.m.
Suggest removal
ItsJustme writes:
Mike: "Why are we raising taxes so more kids can attend school free?"
Simple - cradle to workforce state paid training is a socialist dream. They are working on the top end with this issue. They are also trying to pass state paid 2- and 3-year old pre K.
They want your children to be nice proles. Heck, the best and brightest may even make the Inner Party with proper indoctrin..., I mean education.