I would hope the money would follow the student and not blindly go to the school. Let the schools compete and let’s put trade schools in the mix.
New Dorm Construction?
- Thread starter PSUFTG2
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I would hope the money would follow the student and not blindly go to the school. Let the schools compete and let’s put trade schools in the mix.
That's a pretty good idea. Assume you're not limiting the choice of schools to only in-state.
It is interesting, I think, that talk of "performance based funding" has been rearing its head as of late - both from Harrisburg and from at least a few of the university presidents.
Terms like that always sound appealing - until one spends five minutes thinking about "How would one even begin to try and measure - appropriately - what is "performance"? And how do we tie funding to it?"
Perhaps the best way is as Leinbacker mentions - tie the $ to the student - and let them (the market) determine where the performance/value is. ie: Instead of the Commonwealth doling out $X to each school, provide grant of $X to each PA kid going to any PASSHE or State-Related school - - - and then let them decide which one gets their money.
If a particular school thinks they are FIGJAM, they should LOVE that idea. All schools start on a level playing field (more or less), and they reap in those state funds based on the degree to which they attract PA students.
Such a system would - given that it involves both Higher Ed and State Gubmint - be far easier to say than to do, but movement towards that goal might not be a bad idea. Say something like reducing funding to the state schools - but balancing that off with equal increases to PHEAA and other types of "direct to consumer" funding. The state could then establish parameters for that funding - as opposed to PHEAA which, I think, is all need based - they could do things like set up grants of the same amount for every student, have some that are merit as well as need based, enhanced amounts for kids pursuing certain fields of study that are seen as more valuable to the state, etc etc
Not an easy task - and I don't know how confident I would be that Harrisburg could handle it well..... but with the way things have been going the conversations are worth having.
