Posted by E!!
on December 30, 2008
Balanced Budgets,
Education /
No Comments
Patrick Gibbons, a staff researcher at the Nevada Policy Research Institute, has a good column on higher education costs in the Reno Gazette-Journal. He cuts through the hype and runs down the realities of the present budget crunch and then offers some viable cost-saving solutions based on success stories from Virginia Tech and other universities.
Gibbons says Nevada needs to become better educated about delivering efficient, effective higher education services so rising costs (and fees) do not exceed inflation and income growth.
Jim Rogers and others need to leave the Stone Age behind and get with a financially responsible, 21st century program.
If you are interested in learning more or becoming involved in education reform in Nevada, consider attending this conference on Wednesday, January 14. E!! will be there to listen and learn along with many business and community leaders.
Tags: costs, Education, higher education, Nevada, NPRI, Patrick Gibbons, raise, reform, rising, state budget, Taxes, tuition, UNLV, UNR
“Our schools deserve parents’ support” was the scintillating headline of Nevada System of Higher Education chancellor Jim Rogers’ op-ed in the Las Vegas Sun on Tuesday. Rogers kicks his column off by equating Nevada’s per-pupil funding levels to child abuse and neglect. (Read it to believe it!)
Rogers then goes on to criticize Nevadans for not paying enough taxes to adequately fund education in Nevada.
FACT ONE: Based on U.S. Census data on K-12 spending and doing a little quick math, Nevada spent $8,926 per student in 2006 which, at an average classroom size of, say, 30, works out to $267,780 per classroom year.
FACT TWO: 43% of Nevada’s fourth graders are functionally illiterate, according to the National Assessment in Education Progress reading test.
Even allowing for the 3 to 18% of Nevada’s students who are ELLs (English Language Learners, meaning those who speak only or primarily Spanish) and who naturally cannot be expected to test as fully literate in English, that 43% is a pretty dismal number.
How is it that over a quarter of a million dollars of spending PER CLASSROOM is not enough money to ensure that by fourth grade our students have learned to read with basic competency?
And Rogers wants to lecture the taxpayers about ABUSE and NEGLECT…?
You can reach Rogers by email at chancellor@unlv.edu or call his office at (702) 889-8426.
Tags: abuse, chancellor, Education, fourth graders, funding, good grief, higher education, illiterate, Jim Rogers, neglect, reading, so-called, students, Taxation, Taxes, taxpayers
“When examined as a whole, I find it impossible to believe that there is simply no way to reduce spending within the system of higher education. . . . The system of higher education currently employs 1,328 people who are paid $100,000 or more annually.”
- Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons, 8/20/08
“The top 452 (university system employees)…all make more than the governor, who receives $140,000 a year. The highest paid university system employee is [Dr. William Zamboni, head of the School of Medicine's surgery department] who receives $1.4 million a year in compensation not counting health and retirement benefits.”
- Nevada Appeal, 8/21/08
Tags: $100, 000, Blogs of Nevada, compensation, employees, good grief, higher education, mind-blowing, salaries, statistics, university
