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Doyle has touted his proposed funding for the University of Wisconsin System as allowing campuses to add students, expand research and increase financial aid. But the fine print reveals far more plans for the 13 four-year universities and 13 two-year colleges.
Tuition would go up at the flagship UW-Madison campus by nearly $500 over two years. Similar annual increases of
4 percent are estimated across the system under his budget.
And students worry the increases will be even higher in the end to pay for employee raises — a top system priority not included in the budget, said Lilia Williams of United Council, which lobbies on students’ behalf. “We don’t want to see employee raises funded on the backs of students.”
The Board of Regents will not set tuition rates until this summer after the governor signs the budget into law.
One exception would be UW-La Crosse, which would be allowed to test a pilot program that dramatically increases tuition to pay for enrollment expansion and increased financial aid. The increases are expected to add up to $1,300 over three years on top of smaller annual hikes for inflation.
Doyle spokesman Matt Canter was critical of the UW-L plan during the governor’s re-election campaign last fall, saying he believed it would make the university less accessible. He said the governor has since learned more details and believes it “will promote access and affordability for more students.”
The extra money would pay for adding 1,000 students, more financial aid and scholarships for low-income students and more professors and staff members. The goal would be for half of the new students to be minorities or low-income.
Critics have assailed the plan as a tuition hike for diversity, but Chancellor Joe Gow said it’s a way for the university to educate more students while maintaining quality.
Not shying away from controversy, Doyle is pitching three proposals previously defeated by lawmakers: domestic partner benefits, in-state tuition for some illegal immigrants and collective bargaining rights for professors and academic staff.
Rep. Steve Nass, R-Whitewater and chairman of the Assembly Colleges and Universities committee, said all three plans were dead on arrival. He denounced the governor’s “extremely liberal” agenda for higher education.
“It’s pretty much everything for everybody and you’re all going to be happy, but I’m not going to tell you how I’m going to pay for it,” he said.
UW System spokesman David Giroux said the benefits for domestic partners, offered by many top universities and companies, are needed so campuses can compete to attract the best talent. But lawmakers have rejected them in the past over concerns about their cost and Nass said they undermine marriage.
Doyle’s plan would provide in-state tuition to illegal immigrants who graduate from Wisconsin high schools and have been in the state for at least three years. The plan would save them from having to pay out-of-state tuition, which is often out of reach.
Lawmakers rejected the idea two years ago and Doyle’s critics used it against him during his re-election campaign. But Canter said those students should not be punished “because of who their parents are or where their parents came from.”
Doyle also recommends giving an estimated 17,000 UW professors, researchers and other staff members the ability to form unions, a right enjoyed by all other state employees.
Some administrators have expressed concerns that locking them into union contracts would take away their flexibility to add courses to meet students’ needs and to hire and retain star professors.
