Despite expected lower state revenues, MSU is asking the state to take a closer look at next year’s funding for the university.
The MSU Board of Trustees approved Friday MSU President M. Peter McPherson’s 2002-03 state appropriations request.
The request asks the state to address the per-student funding gap between MSU and the state’s two other research institutions, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University.
In the past, the state has done little to bring MSU’s per student funding on par with the other two institutions. This year, MSU lagged more than $1,500 per-student behind U-M and $2,600 behind Wayne State.
McPherson said a cover letter attached to the request will explain MSU’s special situation.
“We have held down tuition as nobody else in the state has and now in hard times it is not reasonable, since we have been tightening our belt all these years, to treat us as if we are like everybody else,” he said.
The board also decided to reallocate $15 million of MSU’s $500 million portfolio to a Tudor Investment Corporation fund to keep with its low-risk investment strategy.
The board also approved the university naming policy, setting guidelines for naming facilities in light of next year’s capital campaign.
The policy forbids the university, but not donors, from naming a building after MSU community members until they are five years deceased. The policy’s introduction, however, emphasized the guidelines can be altered for a “well-justified exception.”
