Towson supporters, including several members of the board, have suggested that institutions with growth ambitions – TU, chief among them – should receive additional monies. At a budget hearing before the House of Delegates Wednesday afternoon, President Robert Caret alluded to the behind-the-scenes discussions.
"We’re working with the Board of Regents to see how we can continue to grow at a pace that would enroll 25,000 students by 2012," Caret said. "In order to do that, we have to really revisit the ways our campus is funded."
USM Vice Chair David Nevins, who sat next to Caret at the hearing, is in complete agreement.
"The university system needs to grow its capacity to serve students," Nevins said in an interview earlier this week. "We don’t have enough seats. If we are to grow the system, Towson and one or two other places are the most obvious places…where that growth would take place."
Nevins said the nitty-gritty details haven’t been examined yet. But he made one thing very clear.
"It is time to decide," he said.
A financial commitment to growth
USM’s comprehensive universities, including Towson, have traditionally shared a relatively small part of the system’s budget. In essence, they split up the rest of the pie after University of Maryland College Park, historically black institutions and professional schools take big bites. Towson supporters believe it’s time for that to change.
"If we are committed to growth, it’s my view that perhaps we should fund growth off the top," Nevins said.
He said the conversations should reach a crescendo and a decision by June 30. It could involve a board resolution to fund growth at a certain level, or it could include Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich deciding that he will increase funding for the university system with an eye toward growth.
When Towson supporters talk about their budgetary aspirations, they choose their words carefully, especially because no formal proposal is on the table. Regent Michael Gill, former chair for Towson’s Board of Visitors and a University alum, said he has spent hours discussing fiscal issues with Nevins and other officials.
"Here’s what one of the many strategies might be," Gill said. "As new monies come in from the [state government], we wouldn’t wait to see if anything’s left over." He is imagining "the possibility of allocating dollars early in the process toward that growth objective."
Gill described a scene where institutions could "take it off the top of new dollars coming in."
"[There are] lots of different ways to do this," he said. "It starts with a formal designation by the system about Towson being the first priority in terms of increasing the number of seats available to incoming freshmen or transfers, realizing that there’s additional funding needed for us to do that."
And then comes the most important element: "Then we have to have a real solid formula – not a promissory note – but a really solid formula for how Towson gets the monies to do that."
If the university system dedicated certain funds to growth, Towson would benefit – "but it’s not being done for Towson, it’s being done for growth," Nevins stressed.
The idea of routing additional funds from the state toward Towson echoed Caret’s sentiments.
"We wouldn’t be taking away from other institutions," he stressed after a regent meeting last month.
Gill’s brother Gary, the current TU Board of Visitors chairman, called it "a process of educating the regents in terms of the role we think we should be playing, the role we’re prepared to play."
"But we can’t do it with smoke and mirrors," he added. "We need adequate funding."
The funding hurdle
Towson supporters will push for adequate funding at a University System of Maryland retreat on April 20. At the retreat, USM officials and institution presidents will discuss budget allocations for the 2007 fiscal year, which begins July 1, 2006. Caret is expected to push for additional funding.
"The campuses are going to be invited to present their views of what they need in the future," he said.
The retreat will help stimulate conversations about how to balance the board’s three overarching priorities: quality, access and affordability. USM Chancellor William Kirwan said it would require "some difficult decisions" due to fiscal constraints.
"There are people who will say growth is the most important thing, so we have to fund growth," Kirwan said. "Others will say we have to protect quality, that you can afford to let quality of the institutions erode. I don’t know if there’s a perfect answer."
Caret said he would like to see growth aspirations be weighted more heavily when the university system allocates funds.
"Our system tends to look at all the variables pretty evenly," he said. "We’re saying enrollment growth should be one of the highest variables – not necessarily the highest, but up there with the most important variables."
It’s hard to find an official opposed to growth. The real hurdle will come when it’s time to fund the initiative.
The board "wouldn’t have any problem tomorrow agreeing to the concept. But it goes back to the financial piece again. Now that we’ve said that Towson is designated growth university, "the funding needs to follow," Gill said.
In the months after the retreat, a public document will lay out a strategy for each campus. This process is attuned to the system’s efforts to offer a four-year outlook regarding tuition levels for each institution.
As Nevins explains, the name "College Park" conjures up an immediate reaction in every Marylander. As the university system’s premiere research institution, its mission is clear. The same can be said for the state’s historically black institutions, and professional schools like the University of Maryland Baltimore.
But what about the Towson, Salisbury and Frostburg – the so-called "comprehensive institutions?"
Historically, they haven’t demonstrated a clear vision or mission -- they don’t "tell and sell the story," as Caret would put it.
And that’s the problem, according to Nevins.
"Towson has never ranked very high in the pecking order when time came to allocate the budget," the TU alum explained. "I think it is time to tell that story – the Towson story and the comprehensive universities story – a bit more effectively, so as to impact the pecking order."
Regent Michael Gill hopes his colleagues on the board will offer more than a directive supporting Towson’s growth plans. He said his colleagues should "put our checkbooks where our feelings are."
Plan A or Plan B?
Caret has recently started to speak about two paths for Towson’s future, depending on budget scenarios.
Under plan A – the growth path – Towson’s enrollment would increase ambitiously. The plan would require a commitment of funding to facilitate that growth. It is the path that most Towson officials expect to take. But in recent months, President Caret has suggested a second path is possible.
"The other path is 16,000, 14,000, high SAT, high GPA, high tuition, much more selective, much more privatized," he told alumni employees last month.
Plan B – the selective path – would be instituted if the funds do not become available "[In plan B], Towson becomes a non-growth institution, and concentrates simply on the development of the programs it already has, and improving its quality and its reputation without regard to growth," Nevins said.
Caret is to describe both plans to USM officials at April’s retreat.
"I’m going to present the growth plan and say ‘here’s what I need to do it,’" Caret said. "And if we can’t afford that, here’s another plan…that would become more self-sufficient over time. We’ll work with them to see which way they want to do it."
Listening to board members and University officials, one becomes aware of all the competing forces in play. Nevins said either plan is potentially a good one for Towson, as long as it’s one or the other, and not some combination of the two.
"I think Towson is at a crossroads in many ways," he said. "The one thing it seems to me that would be unfair to Towson is if a commitment is not made one way or the other. That is to say, it is hard to be a growth institution – this year you get money to grow, the next two years you don’t, the next year you do – depending upon the whims of whatever governor is in power, or whatever legislature is in power. I think an institution is either a growth institution or it’s not. It can’t be going back and forth all the time."
Kirwan and Vice Chancellor for Administration and Finance Joe Vivona have agreed that any funding for growth should be consistent.
Caret has said the selective path would be easier and more fun – but not in the best interest of the state of Maryland. The selective path "doesn’t achieve access or affordability," Michael Gill pointed out.
Nevins said the idea of a "selective path" isn’t a threat or a joke.
"Everything’s on the table," he asserted.
Kirwan said the budget issue is one that "the Regents will ultimately have to address."
The coming months will determine whether a funding commitment will enable the University to enable its growth vision.
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