Category: State budget

University of Wisconsin-Extension officials are mulling consolidating services across counties to absorb a budget hit.

University of Wisconsin-Extension officials are mulling consolidating services across counties to absorb a budget hit.

The two-year state budget Gov. Scott Walker signed in July cut $250 million from the UW System. Extension’s share of that cut is $7 million over the biennium.

Republican legislators want to pass the six bills that make up Governor Walker’s college affordability package, but new budget projections could put it in jeopardy.

The average student loan borrower in Wisconsin pays off about $3,300 dollars in debt each year, but can only deduct up to $2,500 of the interest on those loans from their state income taxes.

Noted: But the Governor is still fighting the release of other records that shed light on the process his administration went through when it altered the Wisconsin Idea – a part of the UW System’s mission statement – as it put together the 2015-16 state budget early last year.

In the initial release of his budget plan, Gov. Walker changed the UW System’s mission to “meet the state’s workforce needs.” He also proposed striking language about public service and improving the human condition, and deleting the phrase: “Basic to every purpose of the system is the search for truth.”

Gov. Walker scrapped the changes after a strong public reaction against them, blaming it on a “drafting error.”

Citing what it sees as systematic abandonment of the state’s largest city, faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee on Monday called for an immediate change to the way state funding is divided among Wisconsin’s two research universities.

If UWM’s per-student funding from the UW System were increased to just half the level that UW-Madison receives, it would yield an additional $23.6 million and eliminate UWM’s structural budget deficit, according to the UWM chapter of the American Association of University Professors.

While UW-Madison receives more than $12,400 per student, UWM receives less than $5,200 per student — 40% of UW-Madison’s per-student allocation.

The Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education released a report Wednesday detailing additional effects of the Wisconsin state budget throughout the UW System.

The University of Wisconsin System’s tuition balance shrank last fiscal year and will drop dramatically over the next year as the system contends with a Republican-imposed tuition freeze and budget cuts, according to system financial reports and projections released Monday.

Campuses across the University of Wisconsin System are slashing hundreds of jobs as they cope with a $250 million state budget cut, according to an organization that studies higher education. The Wisconsin Center for the Advancement of Postsecondary Education is tracking how the UW System’s colleges and universities have cut costs in response to the reduction in state funding.

Noted: [Alex] Hummel says reductions were the result of changes that had been underway before lawmakers cut $250 million from the UW System in the new state budget. But he says eliminating the positions will help the system cope as it absorbs the budget cuts.

Noted: To close a shortfall in the current budget, Walker and GOP lawmakers cut aid to the University of Wisconsin-System by $250 million in the current two-year budget, a decrease that followed a $300 million cut in the 2011-13 budget.

The ink is barely dry on a new state budget that aims to make the University of Wisconsin System more nimble and efficient, and already another idea to reshape public higher education in Wisconsin is under review by Assembly Republicans.

Wisconsin doesn’t have a single, unified community college system — and many of the educators at the state’s two-year institutions say that’s a good thing. But as a legislative committee considers possibly merging the state’s two separate two-year systems, some politicians are questioning whether a more traditional community college model would work better for the state.

Noted: Wisconsin has already turned down $560 million from the federal government to pay for Medicaid under President Barack Obama’s health care law, which Walker has steadfastly opposed and wants to repeal. That’s enough money, Democrats and supporters of the law point out, to undo a $250 million cut to the University of Wisconsin approved in the recently passed budget and increase funding for K-12 public schools.

Leaders at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse are concerned about the effect changes in state law on shared governance and tenure will have on the campus.

UW Colleges Chancellor Cathy Sandeen says that two-year schools will keep their traditional close ties to local communities, despite the sweeping reorganization announced Tuesday.

Nearly 30% of administrative positions will be cut on campuses as leadership and management of the state’s two-year public colleges are consolidated into regions over the next several months.

The pending layoffs — estimated at the equivalent of 83 full-time positions — are in response to state budget cuts and two more years of a tuition freeze handed down by state lawmakers and Gov. Scott Walker, announced University of Wisconsin Colleges and UW Extension Chancellor Cathy Sandeen on Tuesday.

The University of Wisconsin is eliminating 83 administrative and staff positions at two-year college campuses across the state in a sweeping reorganization that was announced Tuesday.

University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Chancellor Mark Mone told faculty, staff and students at a campus forum Thursday that he remains bullish and confident about the future, though realities of the new state budget will make the next two years “immensely challenging.”

With the $5.2 million in cuts to the University of Wisconsin Extension, officials say there’s no doubt programming will be impacted at UW-Extension Rock County.

Gov. Scott Walker signed the biennial state budget in Waukesha July 12, revealing the exact effects it will have on the UW-Madison community.

UW System professors no longer have tenure defined by state statutes as a result of Gov. Scott Walker’s 2015-’17 budget, which has left some worrying that university faculty and researchers will leave to find more secure jobs elsewhere.

University of Wisconsin student leaders are relieved that Gov. Scott Walker has vetoed parts of a policy to scale back shared governance at state universities. They say things like shared governance and tenure aren’t safe in the hands of state lawmakers.

Vacant job openings will remain unfilled, and some staff cuts are coming, as the result of a reduction in state spending for the University of Wisconsin Extension.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker – who announced a 2016 presidential bid Monday – faces intense criticism from higher education activists, after signing a $73 billion state budget that makes hefty cuts to the University of Wisconsin system and significantly reduces tenure protections for faculty.

About 24 positions will be eliminated from the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, mostly in the areas of academic advising and support services, to address a nearly $3 million annual reduction in state funding.

The University of Wisconsin-La Crosse will see one of the largest budget increases of any University of Wisconsin System campus next year, up nearly $3.9 million.