Colleges and universities that are stripped of some state funds because students aren't progressing toward graduation would have a second chance at that money under a proposal.
The Arkansas Department of Higher Education is developing a way to help those institutions -- as long as they can come up with improvement plans to address their deficiencies.
For decades, higher education institutions have received state funding largely on the basis of enrollment. But, in 2011, legislators added another type of funding mechanism for the state's colleges and universities in response to then-Gov. Mike Beebe's call to double the number of degree holders in Arkansas by 2025.
Still, 90 percent of a school's funding allocation comes from the enrollment portion of the formula, while only 10 percent is a result of measures known as performance-based funding. If an institution performs poorly on those measures -- and scores below the minimum of six out of 10 points -- it is at risk of losing some state funding.
Since the performance-based funding model was initiated, no colleges or universities had fallen below the minimum score -- until now. The University of Arkansas at Monticello fell short of the minimum score at 5.16, according to the Department of Higher Education.
"When you have an institution that's struggling with some part of the formula of getting students enrolled and getting them to a degree, the worst time to take funding from them is the time when they're trying to correct something in that process of getting students to some completion," department Director Brett Powell said. "So the performance-based funding is there for a reason -- to make sure that institutions are working toward improvements. But whether that funding should be lost immediately or not is where the proposal came from."
Under the proposal, a college or university that scores below the minimum score for the first time can submit an improvement plan. The plan would detail how the institution can strengthen its shortcomings, along with a budget for the actions it plans to take.
A committee made up of Higher Education Department staff members and college and university leaders would then determine if all or a part of the funding at risk should remain with the underperforming institution.
If the plan is insufficient -- or if the institution falls below the minimum score for a second consecutive year -- it would lose the funding.
When the state adopted the performance funding model, the law left out two pieces: how much funding an institution should lose if it scores below the minimum, and if it does lose the money, what happens to those funds?
The state Higher Education Coordinating Board agreed that schools should lose more funding as they fall further from the minimum score.
The board will consider the proposal to restore funds during its July meeting.
If an institution loses performance-based funding, the money would be available to other schools to compete for by submitting plans on how they would use it to improve their own institutions' performance.
Universities are gauged on four measures, including the number of bachelor's degrees awarded and progression toward graduation. Those measures are weighed against "optional measures" such as the number of credentials earned by students who need remedial coursework or those earned by minority-group students.
For four-year institutions, the Higher Education Department takes the average of those measures for the past two years and compares it with the average of the measures over the past three years.
Last year, the University of Central Arkansas and Southern Arkansas University-Tech in Camden fell short of the minimum score. They were among the institutions with initiatives to either award degrees for students who earned them but never received them or to encourage adults to return and finish a degree, Powell said.
The initiatives at those institutions would cause an increase in the average, but it would return to normal in the following years, he added. But the performance funding model included a "hold harmless clause" that wouldn't penalize those institutions from trying to move students toward a degree, Powell said, adding that department staff wouldn't count the extra degrees so as not to skew the average.
So, UCA and SAU-Tech were spared funding cuts.
This year, UA-Monticello didn't make the cut.
And now, it's at risk of losing $182,949.48.
"First off, UAM will submit a plan for improvement," its acting chancellor, Jimmie Yeiser, said. "I can tell you that retention is a big part of the plan we will prepare and submit to ADHE. We will be looking at those things we can do to help our students succeed."
Yeiser, who is also the university's provost, said UAM officials will help students become more computer literate and focus on students' progression toward graduation. He added that staff and faculty should engage students more in the learning process and give them "a little taste of success."
"Some of our students are not really confident that they're college material," Yeiser said. "Hopefully, we can make our students realize that they are college material."
Retention is a problem at the 3,854-student university, officials have said.
Data from the department show that the university improved its retention rate last year, but it was still the lowest among the four-year public institutions.
Of the 623 students who enrolled at UA-Monticello in fall 2013, 46.4 percent stayed on the next year. Of the 726 students who enrolled in fall 2012, 42.3 percent signed up for classes the next fall, and 29.6 percent did for fall 2014.
UA-Monticello has a lot of first-generation college students, UA System President Donald Bobbitt said.
"And it has been my experience -- and I think this is true in a number of studies -- that students with no familiar family experience at higher education will hit a bump in the road, as we all do, and will consider it to be an insurmountable hurdle as opposed to a minor speed bump in the path toward a college degree," Bobbitt said. "And the way you have to overcome that is you have to understand what those bumps are and you have to be fairly intrusive in helping students over them."
While Bobbitt had not looked at UAM's record in detail, he had worked on similar problems when he led the University of Texas at Arlington. The two schools have a similar student demographic, he said.
"I have had a conversation with [Yeiser], and I shared with him some of the strategies that we found to be successful," he said. "You have to understand that institutions are subject to a lot of stresses, some of which are under their control and some of which are not."
The Higher Education Department staff did a good job of coming up with a system that allows the institution the opportunity to justify the funds for targeted interventions to correct deficiencies, Bobbitt said.
"I think the policy does that," he said. "I also agree that if progress is not made toward addressing a discrepancy, then the funds should be redistributed to other institutions that are willing to do the heavy lifting, if you will."
Arkansas State University System President Charles Welch also backs the proposed policy, which he called a "reasoned approach."
"Unfortunately, in an environment where a large number of our institutions are not adequately funded and are enrolling a large number of underprepared students, our performance funding system can be punitive. Additionally, it can be a bit awkward to take money away from an already underfunded institution and then charge them with improving," Welch said.
"The proposal from the ADHE staff recognizes these issues and allows the institution to create targeted programs and approaches to resolve the problem areas. This results in greater focus on the specific issues where the institution is struggling, while also allowing for an opportunity for improvement rather than further reduced funding."
State Sen. Jane English, R-North Little Rock, who is the chairman of the Senate Education Committee, said she had heard of the proposed policy but didn't know the details.
"I understand what they're trying to do," she said. "The idea is to increase the graduation rate and keep kids in college."
Arkansas has one of the lowest graduation rates nationwide, with 40 percent of 15,193 public university students entering in fall 2009 and graduating six years later.
Powell said he would send guidelines for the policy to UAM officials soon, so the university can immediately turn over an improvement plan shortly after the Higher Education Coordinating Board votes.
Yeiser said he is pleased to have a second chance at those funds.
"We're going to put our best foot forward," he said. "I want to position it so we don't experience this again."
Bobbitt was disappointed that the Monticello school fell short of the minimum score.
"It's a shame," he said. "But I think you're going to find that over an extended period of time, schools will fall in and out of the glare of the performance funding."
A Section on 06/06/2015