In a contest of crises, the floods of Floyd won out over the underfunding of UNC. Or so it would appear. Certainly the state faced a crisis in the hurricane’s wake. But is the situation facing UNC right now a crisis?
The beginning of a new year is really only the progression of one day after the next, natural and mundane, but human custom has made it so that we note it as the crossing of a threshold. This customary observance is heightened now as the upcoming threshold is especially (but only) numerically significant (from year 1999 to year 2000). Here Clarion Call bows to custom to mark this crossing by presenting three higher-education issues of 1999 that will bear watching in 2000.
Two department heads at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill took their case for tuition increases to cover faculty salary increases to the students last week. David Guilkey, professor and chairman of the Department of Economics, and Ed Samulski, professor and chairman of the Department of Chemistry, wrote an editorial in the student newspaper, The Daily Tar Heel, Oct. 28 in favor of a five-year plan to raise tuition at UNC-CH by $1,500.
A new study challenges the assumption that an education from an elite college translates into greater earnings than an education from a less prestigious school.
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is in crisis, according to professors and students who squared off in a debate this week over a plan to increase student tuition. The tuition increases would be used to boost faculty salaries. The debate was sponsored by UNC-CH’s Dialectic and Philanthropic societies.
Students, state legislators and private donors may soon be asked to help raise faculty salaries at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, despite evidence that UNC-CH’s faculty salaries there are among the highest in the nation.
This year’s House budget proposal of $13 billion includes tremendous gains for higher education, including millions more for community colleges. The full House is expected to vote on the budget this week.
St. Augustine’s College of North Carolina made national headlines last week when it announced the firing of admissions director, Keith M. Powell. The announcement prompted the resignation of the entire admissions staff, except for a counselor who was on vacation until Monday, The Chronicle of Higher Education reported on March 11. Graham Watt, executive assistant to the president, said that the decline in enrollment at St. Augustine’s did not factor into the decision to fire Powell. Watt told The News and Observer on March 9 that the decision was part of a larger effort to make the college more efficient: “We talked about it as an administrative team…. It brings the whole process together. It just works better when you have people not bumping into each other and working in harmony.”
Members of the State Board of Community Colleges met today to begin developing a proposal for financing capital needs at the state’s community college campuses. The North Carolina Community College System (NCCCS) announced last Friday that they would partner with UNC to create a funding package that would address both systems’ capital needs.
An estimated 12.5 cents out of every $1 increase in tuition goes to pay for compliance with federal regulations.
