Education in Tennessee seems to be constantly on the chopping block. The revenue stream in Tennessee is less predictable than in most states because there is no state income tax - just an outrageous sales tax.

The Pacer, an independent paper at UT-Martin, carried a story back in late September that quoted UT President John Petersen:

"Education and higher education were protected for a long time, and the hole got deep enough that they (the governor and the legislature) couldn't do that, and we ended up with about a 4.1 percent cut across the state, which for us at the University of Tennessee is a little bit over $22 million," Petersen said.

the Pacer piece said that Petersen and the UT Board of Trustees were trying to balance rising costs, budget cuts and tuition increases. UT upped tuition by 6 percent for 2008-09.

Now a piece this week in the Chattanooga Times Free Press that the $22 million figure has been reduced to about $17 million. But statewide revenue is still running over $100 million short of budget needs, the size of the cuts could eventually grow...


Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, Bill Manning

The Chronicle of Higher Ed is among news sources that covered the announcement last week from the Department of Education concerning the financial aid application process.

Education Secretary Margaret Spellings announced this evening, as part of an address at Harvard University, that she had been able to whittle the main federal financial-aid application, known as the Fafsa, from 120 questions in six pages down to just 27 questions.

Congress urged Spellings in August to simplify the form. One Department of Ed official suggested back in July that the form could be reduced to just nine questions.

Inside Higher Ed also ran an informative piece on the smaller FAFSA last week.


Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, TIM MCCAIG

University Business ran a story today about Texas A&M's program offering free tuition to incoming freshmen who are residents of Texas.

The program is need based. Freshmen whose families make less than $60,000 a year are eligible for the free tuition offer. In-state tuition at Texas A&M is just under $8,000 a year. Recipients can still apply for other forms of financial aid to cover living expenses at the university.

Texas A&M estimates about 80 percent of its students receive some type of financial aid.


Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, Günay Mutlu

A report by the Rethinking Student Aid Study Group at the non-profit CollegeBoard has blasted the U.S. financial aid system, calling it "peicemeal" and "rickety."

"There's a growing recognition that the federal student aid system is simply too complicated," The report's co-author Sandy Baum told the Christian Science Monitor. Baum is an economics professor at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, N.Y. "We're seeing proposals in Congress; we're seeing the Department of Education talk about simplification.... People are really ready to do something more dramatic to the system."

"We believe that the most important purpose of student aid is to expand the educational opportunities available to those young people and adults who face financial barriers to college enrollment and success," the report's authors said at the CollegeBoard website. In their estimation, the federal government is failing to do that despite spending $86 billion a year on financial aid at the moment.


© cydneycap

Since the start of primary season, the amount of misinformation available about the voting rights of college students has increased exponentially. Last week the Chronicle of Higher Ed carried a news blog about the continuing controversy in swing states like Colorado - where a Republican county clerk "was criticized for falsely stating that students could not register to vote in Colorado if their parents had claimed them as dependents in another state."

The truth is simple. You CAN vote in your college community. Or, you can vote by absentee ballot in your hometown. You just can't do both.


© andrewdavid89

NPR ran an excellent story on campus mental health last week. And while it was set on the campus of Johns Hopkins University, the outreach the story describes could serve as a model for successfully dealing with mental health issues on any campus.

The story quotes Richard Kadison, a college mental health at Harvard University, who says that the stress of the transition to college can bring out depression and other problems. In addition, he says, "more people with diagnoses are going to college because they get treated earlier, and with treatment people are able to get to college, students who never would have been able to get to college in the past."

How does a campus deal successfully with that? Listen to the story here.


© lawmurray