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Students Denied Access to Higher Education, Group Says
As many as 250,000 potential students chose not to attend college in 2003 because of rising tuition costs and cuts in the numbers of students admitted, according to a statement released in January by the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education. The center also says that those students who do attend college are accumulating substantially larger debts than in years past because of unpredictable tuition hikes.
The statement argues that states have reduced higher education funding by amounts that are disproportionate to state budget cuts, thereby creating a “crisis in college opportunity.” According to a recent study by the Center for the Study of Education Policy at Illinois State University, state appropriations for higher education fell by an average of 2.1 percent last year. The center asserts that “governors and legislators should recognize the long-term educational needs of the country and its citizens.” It recommends that if states must cut higher education funding in 2004, they should do so without cutting appropriations to institutions that serve primarily students from low- to middle-income families. In addition, they should freeze tuition at schools and community colleges that have large enrollments from low- to middle-income families. “If money needs to be shifted [to protect these schools], it should be,” to ensure that nontraditional and first-generation students have access to higher education, says Joni Finney, vice president of the center. Also recommended are increases in need-based state financial aid, which the statement says can be paid for with a modest tuition increase at public research universities.
The center recommends that states that can increase higher education fund-ing in 2004 give priority to funding for enrollment growth and hold tuition increases to the rate of growth in family income.
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