If Gov. Jennifer Granholm's proposed plan to balance the state budget reflects the priorities of Michigan residents as she says, then a rocky future lies ahead for the state's universities.
Granholm announced Thursday a 6.5-percent cut to higher education funding as part of a plan to overcome a predicted $1.7-billion shortfall. MSU President M. Peter McPherson said it is "one of the largest, if not the largest, reduction of any component of the proposed budget."
Although 6.5 percent is considerably less than some of the double-digit projections floating around for the 2003-04 fiscal year, it is still a significant amount - especially coupled with the 3.5 percent that was already taken in the current fiscal year.
The continually larger cuts are setting a terrible precedent for the treatment of Michigan's public universities.
If Granholm doesn't consider higher education to be a "priority," then she doesn't consider Michigan's future professionals and leaders a priority.
Granted, we do not envy Granholm's position. She has to look at vital services - health care, K-12 education, corrections - and decide which should be spared and which can afford to be slashed.
And while college is still a privilege and not a necessity to make a living, it's an essential factor in all of the services Granholm deemed higher priorities. All of Michigan's departments and services are so intertwined with one another and contingent on each other's success that their individual priority is nearly unquantifiable. Granholm's challenge is to spread the burden of a bad economy across the board while holding the quality of life in Michigan to a high standard.
McPherson, an experienced financial veteran who came to us after working for the Bank of America and U.S. Department of Treasury, addressed the MSU community through e-mail on Thursday. He painted a grave picture for the university's future saying, "There is no question that we will need to make substantial reductions in programs and services. State appropriations covered 75 percent of the cost of a college education when our students' parents were in school.
He also wrote, "Today, the state covers less than half," and encouraged students to contact their legislators by going to www.budget.msu.edu/legislature.html.
With the latest proposed cut and the reduction of Michigan Merit Award scholarships from $2,500 to $500, higher education moves further from accessibility and closer to impossibility. Students should voice their opinions because those views will otherwise go unnoticed.
Michigan should stop taking its colleges for granted and work harder to have them remain affordable and superior.
