Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Nevada's time to choose

Nevada Higher Ed chancellor Dan Klaich on what will happen is the 22% budget shortfall means 22% cuts for Higher Eduction.

Klaich said the $110 million shortfall could also be met by shutting down entire campuses and programs, with three scenarios of combinations:

*Closing College of Southern Nevada and Nevada State College.

*Closing Great Basin College, Truckee Meadows Community College, Desert Research Institute, University of Nevada School of Medicine as well as Boyd School of Law and UNLV’s dental school.

*Closing Nevada State College, Great Basin College, Truckee Meadows Community College, Western Nevada College, and eliminate UNR and UNLV Athletics and the Agricultural Experiment Station at UNR.

Cutting $110 million from the budget will mean an estimated 15,750 students would be unable to enroll in the Nevada System of Higher Education, a decrease of 14 percent from 2009’s enrollment, Klaich said. And more than 1,000 full-time faculty and staff would lose their jobs.

“We will lose our competitive edge … and add to the already crushing burden of unemployment in this state,” Klaich said. “We will lose the ability to train the workforce for the very economy we wish to attract this state.”


Florida Governor Charlie Crist, a Republican whose state has the second-worst economic downturn in the country after Nevada, proposes to invest in higher education to build a "knowledge economy" for the future.

The choice is ours to make.

2 comments:

  1. How about less trying to scare people and be honest and post the sentence before the thing you are highlighting:
    -----SNIP-----
    To illustrate the size of the budget hole, while emphasizing he wasn’t actually advocating such drastic action, Klaich said the $110 million shortfall...
    -----END-----

    And the REAL proposal he was showing:

    -----SNIP-----
    To meet the $110 million in cuts by the projected March 1 deadline, Klaich said the Board of regents could choose from three scenarios:

    *A 20 percent pay cut across the system.

    *At least five additional furlough days per month for employees.

    *Laying off 1,290 employees.
    ----END----

    Neither sounds appealing but at least be honest

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  2. Fair enough. I simply cut and pasted from the Sun article. As I read it, the real proposal is much more upsetting but if you feel its inaccurate to present the illustration the way I did, I'll accept the criticism.

    ReplyDelete