Alaska is poised to gut its public universities. It would be a statewide disaster.

[DonViejo]

The move may be the most extreme effort yet to undermine state-run colleges.

By Joshua Greenberg and Joseph Little July 3 at 1:43 PM

The University of Alaska was rocked last Friday — and observers of American higher education taken aback — when the state’s governor announced a 41 percent cut to its budget, a move that would not only devastate the institution but greatly hurt the state’s economy. The University of Alaska System’s president, James R. Johnsen, was grim in his reaction: “If not overridden, today’s veto will strike an institutional and reputational blow from which we may likely never recover.”

Other state universities have found themselves in the crosshairs of budget cutters, most famously the University of Wisconsin, but the cuts in Alaska take the attacks on public higher education to an entirely new level.

The cuts are shortsighted and economically unwise, but what makes the decision even more inexcusable is that they are being justified by a contrived budgetary “crisis.”

The state legislature had proposed a $5 million reduction to the university budget, but Alaska Gov. Mike Dunleavy, a Republican, vetoed that proposal and added a cut of $130 million. Although the university reduction is the largest, the governor’s $444 million in overall cuts also touch programs and services such as Medicaid, school-bond debt reimbursement and a state senior-benefits plan, which will simply end. All the cuts will go into effect unless three-fourths of the state’s legislators, 45 of 60, vote by July 12 to overturn the governor’s line-item vetoes — an unlikely proposition.

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/07/03/alaska-is-poised-gut-its-public-universities-it-would-be-statewide-disaster/

[ROB-ROX]

1. REPUBLICANS HATE EDUCATED PEOPLE

I seems when you have states which harbor republicans the first thing they restrict is ANYTHING which can help people. Anything good for business is favored by republicans. Republicans are non Christians and the evil they favor makes their master satan happy.......

[SunSeeker]

2. K & R for exposure.