Concerned about the possible ramifications of the Taxpayer Protection Amendment, the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents will hold a special meeting this week to discuss the controversial piece of legislation.
As UW-Madison students left town for spring break March 10, TPA co-author Sen. Glenn Grothman, R-West Bend, addressed the regents at their monthly meeting in Van Hise Hall and challenged some of the regents' most basic beliefs about the UW System.
Namely, Grothman refuted the board's assertion that tuition is currently unaffordable and even suggested that instead of providing the state with more baccalaureate-degree holders, they may already be graduating too many.
"Almost everybody in the state, unless their parents kick them out of the house … can wind up with a four-year degree for a reasonable amount of money," Grothman said. "Even if we up the tuition again, we are a long, long way away from saying that the university is unaffordable here."
The TPA, which Grothman co-authored along with Rep. Jeff Wood, R-Chippewa Falls, aims to downsize state government and decrease taxes, a move the regents say would likely accelerate the downward trend in UW System state funding.
Because it is a constitutional amendment, the TPA must twice pass both the Assembly and the Senate before going to a referendum. According to Grothman, the amendment would not become law until the 2009-10 fiscal year.
According to Regent Charles Pruitt, who chairs the Business, Finance & Audit Committee, should the amendment pass, the regents "almost certainly" will have to dramatically increase tuition, shrink the size of the university, or both.
"It tells the university system that from now on, it's going to be paid for by tuition," Regent President David Walsh added. "Our dilemma is either we raise tuition or we admit fewer students, and that's the effect of this amendment."
Every regent in attendance took his or her turn questioning the senator, who was accompanied by Wood's legislative assistant, Tim Fiocci.
Regent Brent Smith expressed concern that by cutting funding for UW, the TPA would effectively reduce the number of college graduates in Wisconsin, while the board's policy has been to increase the number of baccalaureate-degree holders in the state.
While Smith said he does not get "any" disagreement about that goal when he speaks with legislators, Grothman downplayed the importance of graduating more students.
"To me, the big problem in this state isn't the shortage of people getting college degrees. It's the shortage of people, once they get the degrees, staying," Grothman said. "On the face of it, it looks like a glut — an excess of people getting college degrees around here."
The senator also refuted reports that the TPA would cripple UW's mission and went as far as to say that the university, as an economic engine, would not suffer should the amendment pass.
One of Grothman's most heated exchanges was with student Regent Christopher Semenas, who expressed his distaste with the proposed amendment by relaying his family's personal difficulties in affording a UW education.
"I don't think you have to, and I don't think everybody needs college," Grothman told Semenas. "Some people worked harder when they were in college, harder in the summers. Other people took more vacations. Some of my good friends back home, rather than go to Madison, went to [UW-Milwaukee] and saved on room and board."
But, Walsh said, times have changed since Grothman's graduation from UW-Madison in 1978, when resident tuition was $631, and added that "every bit" of evidence indicates UW's current resident tuition of $5,618 is pricing out the poorest 40 percent of Wisconsin families.
"This is going to affect students from families such as mine, and this is going to be an issue that my generation is going to have to deal with," Semenas said. "Shouldn't there be an opportunity for students to choose whether or not they would like to go to UW-Madison and have funding for that provided through financial aid? Isn't that important?"
