Stats on RIC

Last Friday, Dr. Tom Schmeling and I testified in front of the RI House Finance Committee Sub-Committee on Education about how Rhode Island College students are suffering because of poor state funding for Higher Education.  Testimony from students about how difficult it is to pay for College, and how their lives have been impacted by working more than students at any New England peer institution, would be influential.  This factors strongly into Performance Based Funding, because the institutions of public higher education in the state will be evaluated by how many of our students graduate in 4 and 6 years, and yet in many cases work requirements (made necessary by difficulty paying tuition and making ends meet) limit students’ ability to complete 15 credits a semester (which is the norm required to graduate in 4 years.)

I quote here from Dr. Schmeling’s testimony last Friday:

"Since FY2008, Rhode Island’s educational appropriations per full-time equivalent student declined 24%, measured in constant dollars (SHEF p.32). 

In support for public higher education, Rhode Island ranks:

• 44th in the nation in educational appropriations per full time student 2014 (SHEF p.39).
• 46th in higher education funding per capita (SHEF p.46).
• 46th in higher education funding per $1000 personal income (SHEF p.46).
• 48th in the percentage of state revenue allocated to higher education.

As a result of declining state support, tuition at Rhode Island institutions of higher learning has risen 34.6% since 2008 .

• We are 45th in net tuition burden as a percent of total public higher education revenue. That is, we ask our students to bear more of the cost of their education than all but five states (p.33)
• Rhode Island is one of only six states where the student tuition burden is more than twice the amount of support provided by the state (p.33)
• In short, across multiple measures of state financial commitment to higher education, Rhode Island is consistently at the bottom of the heap. For those of us who believe that investment in public higher education is a key source of economic mobility for our citizens and of economic growth for the state, it is both disturbing and embarrassing to find that Rhode Island has sunk so low in state rankings on education funding.

These cuts have a clear impact on our students’ ability to complete a college education. For instance, significantly more RIC students have to work off campus to make tuition than at other New England Public Colleges. 31% of RIC seniors work thirty or more hours per week at off-campus jobs, a rate which is about 50% higher than for students at other New England Colleges . Students who must spend so much time working to pay for college cannot devote the time needed to achieve academic excellence. They have a harder time completing a degree in four, five or even six years, and they are more likely to drop out."

Dr. Schmeling is using the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association's State Higher Education Finance Report (SHEF).