ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, February 11, 1997 TAG: 9702110103
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: PHILIP WALZER STAFF WRITER
If the state wants its colleges to avoid stagnation, it ought to lift its freeze on tuition increases, a member of the State Council of Higher Education said Monday. But his colleagues offered little support for the idea.
Northern Virginia lawyer Val McWhorter, in a presentation to the council, said the agency should set a policy specifying how much money colleges will need in the future - and how much ought to come from the state and from tuition.
``The question I think this council needs to address is, where is that money going to come from, how much money do we need if we stand still - content to be 44th in the nation [in state aid per student] - and how much money do we need to move up?
`` ... It's time we stop talking about process and start making some progress.''
Statistics reviewed by the council Monday show the state progressively paying less and the student more for a college education, thanks to budget cuts and big tuition increases in the early '90s. The percentage of the cost of education paid for by students rose from 25 percent in 1988 to 36 percent this year, the study showed.
Last year, the state ranked eighth-highest in the nation in terms of tuition and fees for ``major public universities.'' To help rein in charges, the state instituted a two-year tuition freeze last year. Gov. George Allen says he hopes to extend the freeze through the year 2000 before he leaves office.
McWhorter said he sympathized with the need to reduce students' financial burden. But at the same time, he said, colleges will need more money just to stay even. He estimated that simply to keep up with inflation, colleges will need an extra $220 million in the 1998-2000 biennium.
``If we leave the freeze on, the entire amount - the amount necessary to tread water - is going to have to come from taxpayers,'' McWhorter said. ``We need to address that.''
He did not specifically advocate lifting the freeze during the meeting, but in an interview he said he would support allowing tuition increases equal to the rate of inflation.
Council members and officials said they would begin grappling with the financial issues next month. But McWhorter's colleagues offered little support for dropping the freeze.
Jeffrey Brown, a Circuit City Stores executive from Richmond, said he feared that tuition increases could keep students from attending college.
``It's very important for us to realize that kids will be potentially affected by any kind of increase,'' he said. ``... My one request is we do all this with these people in mind.''
Alan I. Kirshner of Glen Allen, chairman and chief executive officer of Markel Corp., said the state's low ranking in state aid per student shouldn't be a major concern:
``Forty-fourth doesn't mean anything to me. The important thing to me is we're striving for excellence. We can only do what we can afford.''
McWhorter, the only member of the council originally appointed by former Gov. Douglas Wilder, a Democrat, is an ally of the council's director, Gordon K. Davies.
Davies has regularly lobbied Democratic and Republican governors for more money for colleges.
Davies declined to comment Monday on the future of the freeze, but he supported McWhorter's call to craft a policy specifying the appropriate mix between tuition and state aid.
McWhorter was chairman of the agency until last summer, when the council elected Abingdon lawyer Elizabeth A. McClanahan to replace him. McClanahan and other recent appointees have taken a more critical look at college budget requests.
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