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Of merit aid and need-based aid
In his blog, Tower Talk, UT President William Powers Jr. touches today on plans by the alumni association to raise $150 million for merit-based scholarships.
“It may surprise you,” he writes, “to know that more than half of the students with SAT scores in excess of 1400 accepted by UT choose to attend a different university. Indeed, in 2008 the majority of students offered one of UT’s most generous scholarships declined to accept.
“We believe a large number of them receive better scholarship offers — not just from Harvard, Stanford and Princeton, but also from schools that lack the vast array of opportunities of a world-class research university such as UT. Many of these young people would love to come to Austin, but the decision hinges on scholarship support.”
No doubt the 40 Acres Scholars Program by the Ex-Students’ Association, also known as the Texas Exes, could help address the problem.
But there’s another aspect to the issue that Powers didn’t mention. Many of the top schools to which UT loses promising students don’t offer merit-based scholarships. Indeed, that’s the case for the three schools he mentioned. Here’s what those schools’ Web sites say:
Harvard: “Financial aid at Harvard is entirely need-based. Harvard fully supports every student who qualifies for financial aid, based on the family’s ability to pay.”
Princeton: “Princeton financial aid is awarded solely based on need; there are no merit scholarships.”
Stanford: “All university scholarship funds are need-based.”
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St. Edward’s center evacuated safely
Ninety-eight people at St. Edward’s University’s Professional Education Center in Northwest Austin were evacuated this morning after a small plane crashed into another building in the same complex.
The St. Edward’s center is in the Echelon III building at 9420 Research Blvd.
“It was close enough (to the crash site) that the Austin Fire Department is going to be conducting an air quality test in our building that will take place tomorrow, and then they will let us know when it’s safe to return,” said Mischelle Diaz, a spokeswoman for the university. “Classes and meetings there are canceled until further notice.”
The center hosts classes for graduate students and for employees of various companies.
Diaz said 62 corporate students, 18 St. Edward’s students, 11 administrators, six contract instructors and one St. Edward’s instructor were in the building at the time of the plane crash and got out safely.
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UT’s plan to soften budget cuts rejected
A budget-trimming plan to be submitted by the University of Texas System on Tuesday for its 15 campuses will cut a bit deeper than officials had hoped.
System officials had wanted to achieve a state-mandated cut of 5 percent, or $175 million, in spending of general revenue by trimming $134 million and covering the remaining $41 million through reduced debt payments on campus construction projects.
But Matt Flores, a system spokesman, said Monday that state leaders decided that debt payments would be dealt with separately.
UT-Austin President William Powers Jr. told the Faculty Council on Monday that this means his campus must plan for $29 million in cuts rather than $22 million. Of the $29 million, $5 million would be covered by licensing and trademark reserves in the athletic department, Powers said. The goal is to impose most of the cuts on non-academic portions of the university.
“Right now, these are just plans,” Powers said. “We don’t have to deliver the money for some time.” But he added, “This is a very serious threat to the budgets of the university.”
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Kenneth W. Starr reportedly named Baylor president
Kenneth W. Starr, whose investigation of President Bill Clinton led to his impeachment, is the next president of Baylor University, according to a story in the Waco Tribune-Herald.
The story, quoting sources, said Starr was named this morning.
The former independent counsel is currently law dean at Pepperdine University in California.
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Loftin named new A&M president
Texas A&M University regents voted unanimously this morning to name R. Bowen Loftin, former CEO of the marine-oriented Galveston branch campus, president of the A&M flagship in College Station.
Loftin, 60, was picked by the nine-member A&M System Board of Regents as the sole finalist for the job in January.
Loftin had been leading the campus as interim president since the resignation of the previous president, Elsa Murano, and has worked for months smoothing out relations involving faculty members, system officials and the regents.
Murano’s presidency had a rocky start with her selection by the regents in December 2007. The first woman and the first Hispanic to lead the university, she had not been one of three candidates submitted to the regents by a search committee, prompting faculty members to complain that the principle of shared university governance had eroded.
Later, tensions simmered between Murano and her bosses - the regents and system Chancellor Mike McKinney, a former chief of staff for Gov. Rick Perry - on several matters, including a Perry-flavored plan implemented by McKinney to award bonuses to faculty members based on student evaluations. The conflict reached a full boil after a sharply critical performance evaluation of Murano by the chancellor, which Murano called “ludicrous” and “not based on facts.”
Then, a little more than two weeks after Murano’s resignation, A&M’s Faculty Senate approved a resolution of no confidence in McKinney’s leadership. Faculty members said McKinney didn’t consult enough with them before making major decisions.
Loftin said in January that he has sought to bring calm to an atmosphere characterized by “a bit of chaos” by listening to listen to faculty members, students and other members of the A&M community.
He has said that “Job One” is to pursue the culture of excellence outlined in Vision 2020, A&M’s strategic plan, which calls for the school to become one of the nation’s top 10 public universities by that date. A&M was tied with three other schools for No. 22 in the latest ranking by U.S. News & World Report. Rising substantially in such rankings is a tall order because all the top schools are trying to raise graduation rates, trim student-faculty ratios, recruit smarter students and otherwise lift their profiles.
He will be challenged to do that amid orders by state officials that A&M and other public universities plan for a 5 percent reduction in the state-funded portion of their budgets. That comes to about $28 million in cuts for A&M, and higher education institutions could face additional cuts in the 2011 legislative session.
Loftin gave each A&M college and division target goals for cuts and said in a Jan. 22 memo that merit raises may be scrapped next year for faculty and staff and layoffs are possible. Other instructions and key points from Loftin’s memo include:
Vacancies will remain unfilled unless justification is approved by a dean or vice president.
Layoffs should only be made if required to maintain the core mission of the unit.
Auxiliary departments - such as Transportation Services - should not raise current rates without approval from the respective vice president.
The budgets of the Environmental, Health and Safety and police departments won’t be cut.
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UT opens new department, institute for African American studies
From an announcement by the University of Texas:
The University of Texas at Austin has created a new academic department devoted to studying the experiences of African Americans, indigenous Africans and people of African descent around the world and an affiliated institute that will focus on urban policy.
The Department of African and African Diaspora Studies was formally established by the state’s Higher Education Coordinating Board in November and is preparing to hire faculty and offer courses and degrees by the fall.
The department will work closely with the new Institute for Critical Urban Policy, which has been created with the support of members of the Texas legislature.
University alumnus and Houston trial lawyer Joe Jamail has made a gift of $1 million to fund an endowed chair in the department.
“It’s a major step forward,” Anthropology Professor Edmund T. Gordon said of the new department, which he will chair. “These types of programs are very rare. It will be the only Black studies department in Texas and, when established, the only Ph.D.-offering program in the south and southwest.”
Currently, about 30 students major in African American Studies through the John L. Warfield Center for African and African American Studies. Gordon hopes to double that number within a few years and to hire 10 full-time faculty members from outside the university within five years.
“This is a landmark event for The University of Texas at Austin,” said President William Powers Jr., whose support was instrumental in establishing the department and institute. “Not only will the new department and institute offer world-class educational and research opportunities, they also demonstrate the university’s ongoing commitment to diversity and to pursuing understudied areas of scholarship.”
The department will offer bachelor’s degrees this fall. It is applying for approval from the Coordinating Board to begin offering master’s degrees and doctoral degrees in the future.
“The important part of the process up until now was keeping our eyes on the prize,” said Warfield Center Director and Theatre and Dance Professor Omi Osun Joni L. Jones. “To create what we’re beginning to imagine is thrilling.”
Several faculty members in the new department will also be affiliated with the institute, where they will research, analyze and gather data on the state’s African American population and promote scholarship on urban issues. University officials are currently searching for a director to head up the institute beginning this fall.
“The new department is poised to make the University of Texas at Austin one of the premiere schools in the nation for African Diaspora Studies,” said Randy L. Diehl, dean of the College of Liberal Arts. “It will be a place where scholars in history, literature, anthropology and other disciplines come together to further our understanding of the African Diaspora experience and train the next generation of students.”
The university was closed to African Americans until the United States Supreme Court ruled in the 1950 case of Sweatt v. Painter that it was required to admit African Americans to its law school.
The university established an Afro-American Studies Program in 1969 and, in 2007, renamed what had become the Center for African and African American Studies for former Director John L. Warfield.
The Warfield Center will continue to operate after the department is created. It will oversee programs, lectures, faculty and student research, community collaborations and other cultural and educational opportunities on campus. The center’s classroom teaching responsibilities will be transferred to the new department and expanded.
Sophomore and African American Studies major Diane Enobabor said she believes the new department will increase research opportunities for students.
“The major has given me a stronger sense of self awareness,” said Enobabor, an Arlington native who also majors in Government and Latin American Studies. “The new department will be a centralized place for students to study these important issues and learn that Africans and the African experience are not monolithic.”
State Rep. Sylvester Turner, D-Houston, is among a group of lawmakers who has supported the creation of the new department and institute. He praised the move.
“This will be an invaluable resource to the legislature as we work to address issues facing the African American and rapidly growing urban population of our state,” Turner said.
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ACC officials buy land to expand Rio Grande campus
From an announcement by the Austin Community College:
The ACC Board of Trustees unanimously approved a contract late Thursday to purchase additional property for the college’s Rio Grande Campus in downtown Austin.
ACC will purchase three tracts of land adjacent to the campus, totaling about half an acre, for $2.1 million plus closing costs, which are available from 2009 revenue bonds.
The land is located at 1209 and 1215 Rio Grande St. and 605 13th St. Trustees authorized the college to negotiate for the purchase of land in the vicinity of the Rio Grande Campus in February 2007 to allow for future expansion.
ACC’s districtwide facilities master planning is currently underway. That process, scheduled to be completed this year, will recommend specific uses for the property.
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UT officials: Money saved from Cactus closing would go for raises
A plan to shut down the Cactus Cafe and a program of informal classes at the University of Texas was triggered by a directive from top school officials to trim spending by 2 percent and to use the savings for raises.
But students’ desire for more varied entertainment and for more space to accommodate student organizations also figured into the plan.
“If we had not received this 2 percent” mandate, “you and I wouldn’t be talking about this topic,” Andy Smith, executive director of university unions, said in an interview this week.
Student leaders who serve on an advisory board for the student union, known as the Texas Union, defended and explained their support of the administration’s plan in a statement issued late Thursday. But a faculty member who serves on the panel decried the administration’s plan and the manner in which the matter was handled.
“The student members respect and appreciate the Cactus Cafe and what it has meant to the UT and Austin communities,” said the statement by Liam O’Rourke, president of Student Government, and five other students. “The room, however, will go back into the room inventory, and student organizations will be able to reserve and utilize the room for their own performances and programs.
“Although the informal classes embody the vision and many of the core values of the University Unions, the student members advised management that there were higher priorities, such as hours of operation and funding the SEC (Student Events Center),” O’Rourke (pictured at right) said.
The voting members of the advisory board consist of six students and three faculty members. Administrators brought their recommendation to the board and the board approved it but did not actually vote on it.
Thomas Garza (pictured middle right), an associate professor in the Department of Slavic and Eurasian studies, said in a posting on the Save the Cactus Cafe page on Facebook that he and two other faculty members serving on the advisory board were absent during the Jan. 29 meeting at which the panel gave its consent to the plan.
“I know that at least two of us are frequent attendees to Cactus concerts — and have been for several decades,” said Garza, who confirmed the posting. “I join your voices in objecting to this hasty decision made with little input from those who actually benefit from the many joys the Cactus Cafe provides.”
UT President William Powers Jr. (pictured below right) instructed the university’s colleges, schools and other units in the fall to figure out how to free up money for raises next year in anticipation that state funding wouldn’t cover such increases. This year, staff raises are frozen and only about a third of tenured and tenure-track faculty members received raises.
The union has 62 full-time employees and 100 part-time employees.
“We looked at our core mission and said, OK, what is most connected and what is least connected?” Smith said. “Our students are our core mission here at the Texas Union,” but more than 85 percent of the people who visit the café and enroll in the classes are not UT students.
The cafe and informal classes together lose $176,000 a year, with the cafe accounting for $66,000 of that, Smith said. Shutting down both would free up $122,000 for raises while also allowing seven full-time employees in those programs to be reassigned at their current salaries, he said.
The informal classes have been a sore spot among students for many years because the classes occupy space in the student union, and in other buildings on campus, leaving less space for the university’s roughly 1,000 clubs and organizations to use for meetings and other activities.
Students’ complaints about the Cactus haven’t been nearly as forceful, Smith said. But as Powers noted at a campus forum on Tuesday, students’ taste in music doesn’t necessarily match up with the cafe’s offerings, and officials cite that as another reason to close it.
Rachel Walker was those who attended a town hall meeting held Tuesday by University of Texas President William Powers Jr.
“I do not believe the musical fare at the Cactus has been meeting the needs or interests of students,” said Andrew Nash, a theater and dance major, president of the union’s Student Events Center and member of the union’s advisory board. “The lineup at the Cactus does entertain a small slice of the campus demographic, but with this move, we will be able to open it up to a much wider percentage of the student body.”
The cafe’s stock in trade over the years has tended to be singer-songwriters such as Lyle Lovett, Robert Earl Keen and Jimmy Dale Gilmore. Despite occasional appearances by Alejandro Escovedo, Tish Hinojosa and other members of minority groups, the café’s artists have not been a very diverse lot.
As for simply charging higher fees to put the 150-seat Cactus into a profitable mode, Smith said the market wouldn’t bear it. Admission prices generally range from under $10 to $35 or so, depending on an artist’s following.
“It’s a real question as to whether or not in the midst of a downturn as we are and a lowering of demand, which there has been over the last eight years at the Cactus, does raising prices get you more customers or fewer?” Smith said. “Our experience here is that doesn’t generate more income.”
Performers typically get $5,000 or 75 percent of the gate, whichever is more. To boost revenue to a break-even level, the café would need to sell 27 percent more tickets and also raise proceeds from sales of alcoholic drinks the same percentage, Smith said.
Boosting alcohol sales isn’t in the cards for a university-owned site, he said.
“We can’t do that,” he said. “We don’t aggressively market the alcohol.”
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UT System plan would ease spending cuts
The 15 campuses of the University of Texas System are under orders from Gov. Rick Perry, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and House Speaker Joe Straus to submit a plan for cutting 5 percent of state-funded spending. System officials said at a Board of Regents meeting in Dallas today that they’ve figured out a way to ease some of that pain.
Instead of the campuses collectively having to trim $175 million in spending, they would only have to cut $134 million, or 3.7 percent, under the plan to be submitted to state leaders later this month. The remaining $41 million in spending reductions would be covered by reducing debt payments for campus construction projects, said Scott Kelley, the system’s executive vice chancellor for business affairs.
To understand how this would work, a bit of background is in order.
The construction work is funded by borrowed money raised by issuing so-called tuition revenue bonds authorized by the Legislature. Technically, tuition revenue is pledged to pay back the loans. In practice, the state Legislature funds the debt payments.
The Legislature provides public universities with sufficient funding to meet a 6 percent loan payment, Kelley said. The UT System, with a stellar credit record, can borrow money for a bit over 4 percent. So the system typically applies the extra money to the principal, thereby reducing a 20-year payment schedule by a few years.
There’s precedent for temporarily suspending the extra payments toward principal. The UT System did the same thing in 2003, Kelley said.
If the proposal is approved this time, it would mean that UT-Austin would have to come up with a plan to cut about $22 million in spending for the current biennium rather than $29 million, Kelley said.
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A&M considering job cuts in answer to state calls to slash budgets
The Eagle reports today that Texas A&M University officials are considering scrapping merit raises in 2011 and laying off staff to meet a mandate by state leaders to find 5 percent in budget cuts.
Last month, Gov. Rick Perry, Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and House Speaker Joe Straus instructed state agencies, including higher education institutions, to submit budget-reduction plans by Feb. 15.
The three officials, all Republicans seeking re-election, stopped short of asking the agencies to implement the budget cuts.
According to The Eagle report:
Texas A&M Interim President R. Bowen Loftin and Interim Provost Karan Watson gave each college and division instructions about how to plan for the 5 percent reduction in state funding.
The cut amounts to roughly $28 million over the biennium — the two-year period that began Sept. 1.
“We must do what we can to protect our core mission of teaching, research and service,” Loftin said in a memo to his deans and vice presidents dated Jan. 22.
A series of conversations are occurring on campus about how to plan for the reduction, and an official described the process as “fluid.”
The University of Texas’ plan to cut 5 percent, or $29 million, from the state-funded portion of its two-year budget include proposals to shut down the iconic Cactus Cafe in the student union and ax the Informal Classes program.
UT already has eliminated 70 occupied or vacant positions - mostly administrative or management slots - that have been eliminated in the past few months as part of a reorganization of the information technology services unit intended to save $5.6 million. Other layoffs in recent months included those of 13 staff members in the Cockrell School of Engineering and 16 staff members in the McCombs School of Business. The College of Liberal Arts, UT’s biggest academic unit, has dropped a plan to retool foreign language instruction, but scores of lecturers and graduate students could lose teaching appointments in various disciplines. A handful of staff members in the college have been laid off.
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A&M commandant resigns; Betty serving as interim Corps leader
Interim Texas A&M University President R. Bowen Loftin announced last week that Lt. Gen. John Van Alstyne resigned as commandant of the Corps of Cadets, effective Jan. 25.
“Gen. Van Alstyne has served our university — his alma mater, Class of 1966 — with great honor and unquestioned dedication after an Army career in which he distinguished himself as well as his country and his university,” Loftin said in a statement. “On behalf of the entire Aggie family — students, faculty and staff — I thank Gen. Van Alstyne for his decades of exemplary service. He has truly made a great and positive difference in the lives of many young men and women who have chosen to be in the Corps of Cadets during his period of leadership.”
Loftin appointed Col. Jake Betty, who has served as the Corps chief of staff for the past five years, to serve as interim commandant.
Betty graduated A&M in 1973. He has a bachelor’s in agricultural economics and a master’s in education administration. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Infantry in 1973, and served in the Army until 1977.
“I am confident that the Corps is in great hands during this interim period, and I have pledged to him my full support as he takes on this challenging role,” Loftin said in the statement.
Loftin said the process of selecting a permanent commandant will begin soon.
A&M’s Corps of Cadets is the nation’s largest uniformed body of students outside U.S. service academies. Founded as an all-male institution with required participation in the Corps of Cadets, A&M provided more personnel to the military during World War II than any other institution.
Its Corps of Cadets, through affiliations with ROTC programs, commissions more officers into the armed forces than any other campus, aside from the service academies. The A&M Corps has produced more than 250 flag officers - generals and admirals.
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UT’s Powers takes a verbal bruising
William Powers Jr., president of the University of Texas, pretty much took it on the chin Tuesday afternoon at a public town hall meeting about budget matters. Most of those attending the standing-room-only session in an auditorium on campus complained about the university’s plan to shut down the Cactus Cafe in the Texas Union as well as a program of informal classes. I wrote about the forum and related issues for today’s editions.
The various speakers told Powers he was enabling “a travesty,” that he was ignoring the public service component of the university’s mission and that he seems unwilling to reconsider a bad decision.
Powers let the session run 30 minutes longer than its originally scheduled two hours to give nearly everyone lined up behind the microphones a chance to speak. As the forum broke up, he said: “If music helps in time of woe, I think I’ll go home and listen to some music.”
To which someone in the audience replied: “Go to the Cactus!”
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Cactus Cafe could find new home at alumni center
LIVE STREAMING OF THE UT BUDGET MEETING:
The Ex-Students’ Association of the University of Texas said today that it might be able to provide a new home for the Cactus Cafe, an iconic music venue and bar in the student union that officials plan to close in August.
Here’s the announcement posted by the association, also known as the Texas Exes, on its Web site:
The storied Cactus Cafe could be finding a new home on the University of Texas campus — the Etter-Harbin Alumni Center.
Texas Exes CEO and executive director Jim Boon spoke with UT president Bill Powers Tuesday about the idea of incorporating the Cactus Cafe into a planned building expansion set for 2011.
University officials announced over the weekend that the Texas Union would be closing the Cactus Cafe in August due to budget cuts. Informal Classes, too, are set to end.
“We understand the financial pressure the University is under and recognize that it needs to be focused on delivering services to students,” Boon said. “As keepers of the history and traditions of the University, we are always sensitive to experiences that touch students’ lives and create memories for alumni.”
President Powers is scheduled to hold a town hall meeting Tuesday on campus to discuss the proposed budget cuts, including the fate of the Cactus Cafe.
Reaction to the news of the Cactus’ impending closure has been overwhelmingly negative, particularly from alumni. A Facebook group started over the weekend Save the Cactus Cafe currently has more than 13,600 members. University officials have defended the cuts as necessary.
The plan to move the Cactus Cafe to the alumni center would not involve helping Informal Classes.
If adopted, and there were no legal obstacles, the Cactus Cafe would keep its name. The alumni center has its own liquor license and could serve alcohol at performances.
The move could be completed and performances resumed as early as fall 2011.
View 0202cactus in a larger map
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Unsold UT championship gear to go to Haiti
From an announcement from the University Co-op:
A popular question leading up to the final minutes of the BCS Championship game on Jan. 7 was, “What will happen to the thousands of pre-printed BCS Championship shirts if the UT Longhorns do not win?”
An obvious answer came shortly after Jan. 12 when the devastating earthquake hit Haiti. This week, all shirts will be loaded and begin the journey to Haiti, UT University Co-op officials said today.
The decision to donate the items to Haiti was supported by the office of trademark and licensing at the University of Texas at Austin.
The University Co-op is working with Fashion Delivers Charitable Foundation Inc., in association with Kids In Distressed Situations Inc., to transport the 14,000 shirts and hats to Haiti.
The Co-op chose this charitable organization due to the operational efficiency, track record and criteria of the items in need, which are all sizes of new clothes for men, women and children. Along the guaranteed arrival to Haiti, the coordination of the distribution to the individual families is well organized and secured.
They were also among the recommendations by the Co-op’s fashion consulting firm, The Doneger Group.
George H. Mitchell, Co-op President, said, “With the terrible tragedy and loss the Haitian people have suffered and are still experiencing, we do realize this donation may not be very high priority for them. However, we all need clothing and this is a small contribution we can make to assist in their recovery.”
Co-op officials said in the announcement that all updates with video and pictures will be posted to the Co-op Facebook page: www.facebook.com/universitycoop.
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UT to hold town hall meeting on budget
The budget for the University of Texas will be the subject at a universitywide town hall meeting scheduled by UT President William Powers Jr. for Tuesday.
A proposed tuition increase, budget reallocations and plans for a 5 percent reduction in the state-funded budget for the current biennium are expected to be discussed. Plans to shut down the Cactus Cafe in the Texas Union might well come up too.
The meeting, which is open to the public, will be at 4 p.m. in the Avaya Auditorium, Room 2.302, in the Applied Computational Engineering and Sciences Building, 24th Street and Speedway.
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Conference to focus on biography, Supreme Court
The University of Texas School of Law will host a conference on judicial biography and the U.S. Supreme Court on Friday. The event, which is free and open to the public, is in memory of Professor Roy M. Mersky, the beloved and longtime director of UT’s Tarlton Law Library and Jamail Center for Legal Research. Mersky died in May 2008 at the age of 82.
Speakers will include scholars who have written biographies about Supreme Court justices. The list of speakers includes Morton J. Horwitz, a professor at Harvard Law School, and Laura Kalman, a history professor at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Moderators include H.W. Brands, a history professor at UT, and Paul Kens, a political science professor at Texas State University.
The conference begins at 9 a.m. in the law school’s Eidman Courtroom. Additional details are posted on UT’s Web site.
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2nd forum on proposed UT tuition hikes today
University of Texas administrators today are holding the second of two public forums on proposed 3.95 percent tuition hikes in 2010-11 and again in 2011-12.
A nine-member Tuition Policy Advisory Committee wrote in a December report that the pair of increases are needed to stave off further cuts to UT programs and staff. The recommendations by students, administrators and faculty previously were discussed at a public forum last week.
Without the increases in tuition and fees, UT would have to cut at least $17.3 million from its budget during the 2010-11 school year and $14.2 million in 2011-12, officials said.
UT President William Powers Jr. will submit his final tuition increase proposal to the University of Texas System Board of Regents by Sunday. Regents will decide on Powers’ recommendations in March, officials said.
The proposal would apply to all undergraduate and graduate programs except for professional programs such as law and pharmacy, whose students would see various increases depending on the program.
Undergraduate students from Texas would pay, on average, $4,709 in tuition and mandatory fees per semester in 2010-11 under the plan. That is 5.4 percent , or $241, more than current charges because, in addition to a 3.95 percent boost in tuition, it includes a new $65 fee approved in a 2006 student referendum to pay for a Student Activity Center under construction on the east side of campus. Charges would rise to $4,895 a semester in 2011-12.
Undergraduates from Texas currently pay $4,468 a semester.
Since the Legislature authorized Texas public universities to set their own tuition rates in 2003, the cost of tuition and fees has increased by 86 percent, according to a 2009 report by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.
Under pressure from legislators and Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, the UT regents in March 2008 approved a 4.95 percent cap on increases that took effect that fall.
Money generated from increasing tuition will provide the university about $17.2 million in 2010-11 and $18.1 million in 2010-11 after deducting the legally required set-aside for additional student financial aid.
But the committee’s report said the tuition increase will not pay for faculty hiring or salary increases; tuition policy advisers said an 18 percent increase would be required for that.
If you go
When: 1 to 2:30 p.m. today
Where: Avaya Auditorium of the Applied Computational Engineering and Sciences Building, 24th Street and Speedway
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Faculty members say ‘cheese’
Arranging a group photo can be a challenge for even the most skilled and experienced photographers.
Marsha Miller of the University of Texas’ public affairs staff took it in stride as she lined up members of the Faculty Council on the south steps of the Main Building today for the group’s annual photo.
She carefully explained to her subjects that they would have to space themselves so that each person was lined up behind and between two others.
To which Thomas Palaima, a professor of classics, replied: “We’re usually much better at being spaced out.”
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A&M regents name finalist for president
Loftin has served as interim president since June 15, when Elsa Murano resigned under pressure. Loftin had led the university’s marine-oriented branch campus in Galveston. A 16-member search committee has been reviewing candidates for president for months.
Under state law, the A&M System Board of Regents cannot firm up Loftin’s appointment for at least 21 days, but it would be highly unusual for the regents to decide against doing so.
Loftin is a 1970 physics graduate of A&M. He holds a masters and a doctorate in physics from the private Rice University in Houston, earned in 1973 and 1975.
Murano, resigned under pressure in June after a sharply critical performance evaluation of her by A&M System Chancellor Mike McKinney. Murano said the review was “not based on facts.”
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A&M regents could name College Station leader today
The governing board of Texas A&M University could name one or more finalists for president of the College Station campus today.
The previous president, Elsa Murano, resigned under pressure in June after a sharply critical performance evaluation of her by A&M System Chancellor Mike McKinney. Murano said the review was “not based on facts.”
A 16-member search committee has been reviewing candidates for president for months. The chairman of the panel, Richard Box, an Austin dentist and member of the A&M System Board of Regents, told the Bryan-College Station Eagle that the pool had been winnowed to two. He did not identify them, even by gender.
Under state law, the regents must wait at least 21 days before firming up the appointment of a finalist.
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IRS audit of UT under way
The Internal Revenue Service is auditing the University of Texas, Texas A&M University, Lamar University in Beamont and a number of other universities around the nation.
The UT audit began last week and is focusing on executive compensation practices and income unrelated to the university’s educational mission, Patti Ohlendorf, UT’s vice president for legal affairs, said today.
“IRS agents will be on site periodically, and they are asking us for information regarding various campus activities and they will review those activities with respect to income and expenses,” Ohlendorf said. “The exact details I really can’t give you since it just started. It will take some number of months.”
The IRS is also auditing Harvard University and Suffolk University, both in the Boston area, according to published reports. Harvard said in bond-offering documents that it is among 40 schools that will be audited this year, Bloomberg News reported. Jason Cook, a spokesman for A&M, said Wednesday that it was the understanding of A&M officials that about 60 colleges will be audited.
Lea Crusberg, a spokeswoman for the IRS, said the agency could not discuss the investigation of higher education institutions. “By law, I can’t confirm or deny compliance contacts with taxpayers or tax entities,” she said.
The IRS announced in October 2008 that it was sending questionnaires to about 400 public and private colleges, focusing on unrelated business income, executive compensation practices and endowments. IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman said at the time that the information “will help us identify issues and areas that may need more outreach and education or further scrutiny.”
UT, which was among those schools, learned in the fall that it was part of a smaller group scheduled for audits, Ohlendorf said.
“I don’t think it’s worrisome because I think we’ve done, along with the help of the UT System, a very good job over the years. But we believe it will be a very large amount of work,” Ohlendorf said of the audit.
There have been no problems that prompted the IRS to audit UT, said Barry Burgdorf, vice chancellor and general counsel for the UT System.
“How does anyone pick UT? We’re big. We’re prominent. We’re well-known. We always get picked for this stuff,” Burgdorf said.
Ohlendorf said the IRS wants to know whether the university is correctly applying rules on withholding and other tax matters to various elements of executive pay, such as salary and deferred compensation. Executives include the president, deans and vice presidents, she said.
Coaches and other athletics officials are generally not considered executives, but the university doesn’t yet know the full scope of what the IRS wants to examine, Ohlendorf said.
Burgdorf had a somewhat different interpretation, suggesting that executives would include coaches. “You have to ask IRS,” he said. “It’s their purview.”
Football coach Mack Brown is UT’s highest-paid employee, with a $5.1 million package this year that includes salary, a salary supplement, an expense allowance, a car allowance, radio and TV show pay, athletic product endorsements, performance incentives, a special annual payment and an annual service payment.
The question of unrelated business income can be complicated. In general, tax-exempt organizations must pay taxes on income from activities unrelated to their nonprofit status, but they can also deduct some expenses incurred in the course of those activities.
Unrelated business income could include income from renting space in a university-owned building to a retail store that isn’t focused on selling to the university community, Ohlendorf said. Asked whether UT is doing anything like that, she replied: “I don’t think that we are.”
However, UT receives lease income from a grocery store, a coffee shop, restaurants and other businesses on the university-owned Brackenridge tract in West Austin.
“I’m sure the income from that is treated as it should be from a tax perspective, but I’m not a tax lawyer,” Ohlendorf said.
Lamar University, part of the Texas State University System, learned in November that it would be audited, said Roland Smith, the system’s vice chancellor for finance. The IRS indicated the audit could take nine months, he said.
The tax agency has not suggested that anything is amiss, said Charles Matthews, chancellor of the Texas State system, who said he had no quarrel with an audit. “This is state government,” he said. “We’re supposted to be open and transparent.”
Cook, the A&M spokesman, said the IRS is focusing on the university’s 2008 filing of a form used by nonprofit organizations. He said he didn’t have any information about the status of the review.
Carol McDonald, president of the Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas, said she didn’t know whether the IRS is auditing any of the 40 private colleges and universities in the state. B.J. Almond, a spokesman for one of the private schools, Rice University, said it is not being audited.
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