TO CLIPS INDEX February 13, 2009

More budget cuts possible, lawmakers told
The Arizona Republic 2/13/09
Be prepared to cut another $250 million to $425
million from this year's budget, lawmakers were
told Thursday. It's another in a series of ominous
warnings that has been trickling out since law-
makers closed a $1.6 billion gap in the fiscal
2009 state budget less than two weeks ago.
Thursday's notice from the Joint Legislative Bud-
get Committee was based on state tax collections
for January, which are down an estimated 21.5
percent over January 2008. "The January results
are significantly worse that we expected," budget
director Richard Stavneak told the House and
Senate Appropriations Committees.

Students at ASU Polytechnic campus worried
about cuts
The Arizona Republic 2/13/09 7:55 AM
Students, staff and administrators at the Arizona
State University Polytechnic campus in East Mesa
are struggling to come to terms with drastic budget
cut measures announced Tuesday by school
President Michael Crow. For Tim Haas, 24, a
Nutrition and Dietetics major, it means his school,
Applied Arts and Sciences, has been "dis-
established" and its programs moved to the ASU
downtown campus. Haas was studying in the Poly-
technic campus Student Union. "I'll be going down-
town for a lot of classes, that's it," Haas said with
resignation heavy in his voice. "I really like this
campus-its new buildings-and I'm not a big fan
of the downtown campus. But if that's where my
major is, I guess that's where I'll be going."

Community college tuition increase sought
East Valley Tribune 2/12/09 10:38AM
Like their peers across higher education, students
at the Maricopa County Community College District
will likely pay more for their classes next school year.
Administrators are proposing to increase the price
per credit hour at the district's 10 colleges by $5, or
7 percent. For students taking 15 credit hours a
semester, their tuition bill would jump by $150, to
$2,280 for the full school year. The proposal goes
to the district's governing board for a preliminary
review Feb. 24 and will be up for approval in late
March. If approved, Debra Thompson, the district's
vice chancellor for business services, said the
tuition increase will generate about $11 million
for the colleges.

UA, NAU to seek more money from students
Capitol Media Services/Arizona Daily Sun
East Valley Tribune
2/12/09 9:23PM
The presidents of two of the three state universities
said Thursday they already intend to seek more
money from students this coming school year. What
remains to be decided only is how much and in what
way. The comments came as all three presidents
detailed for lawmakers what they are doing to deal
with the $141 million in cuts they had to take in the
latest budget adjustment. That includes plans to
require employees to take time off without pay. The
chances of any of those cuts being restored next year
are virtually nil. That's because the anticipated deficit,
even assuming the $570 million in cuts this year are
not restored, totals about $2.4 billion.

Lawmakers propose $390 million cut to state
universities
Tucson Citizen 2/13/09
Key Arizona legislators identified possible bud-
get cut options Thursday that could approach
approximately $390 million for the statewide
university system. A figure of that magnitude
would be double the $191.5 million in cuts
recently instituted for Arizona State University,
the University of Arizona and Northern Arizona
by the Legislature for the current fiscal year.
Those reductions, from a total of $1.13 billion
appropriated for the universities, helped
eliminate the state’s $1.6 billion budget short-
fall brought on by the crumbling economy. The
universities also get money from tuition and
federal grants. State Board of Regents President
Fred Boice told legislators at a hearing in
Phoenix that possible new cuts would “cause
severe damage.”

City pitches Rio Nuevo to skeptical senators
Tucson Citizen 2/13/09
Rio Nuevo proponents need to find 16 state Senate
votes to preserve an estimated $8.6 million in tax
increment financing for the next fiscal year starting
in July. The eight senators on the Senate Finance
Committee were "underwhelmed" Wednesday as
city and private sector leaders tried to convince the
panel of Rio Nuevo's merits, said state Sen. Jim
Waring, a Phoenix Republican who chairs the
committee. "One member said, 'Is this all there
is after all these years?' " Waring said, recounting
a statement by Sen. Ken Cheuvront, a Phoenix
Democrat. "I would say the committee was
disappointed by the presentation."

Denogean: Cutting social work school here short-
sighted
Tucson Citizen 2/13/09
The state's budget crisis is forcing its universities
to make tough decisions as each cuts tens of
millions of dollars in spending. One will cripple
southern Arizona's ability to provide social services.
The coordinator and supporters of the Arizona State
University School of Social Work Tucson component
say ASU will do great damage to our community by
closing the satellite program. The plan to shut it
down by December was announced by ASU
President Michael Crow this week as one of many
cuts needed to meet an $88 million budget reduction
imposed by the Legislature. The savings will be
minimal and the impact huge, said Ann Nichols,
coordinator of the Tucson component.

Five finalists for dean of UA law school announced
Tucson Citizen 2/13/09
The University of Arizona announced five finalists
for dean of the James E. Rogers College of Law
late Thursday. Only one of the candidates is a
woman and only one is from UA. Toni M. Massaro,
who has served as law school dean for the past
decade, announced in October that she will step
down in July. ....Eller College of Management Dean
Paul Portney chaired the search committee, which
has about 20 members and includes
representatives from UA's student body and faculty
as well as practicing lawyers and judges, according
to a UA press release. The candidates will visit UA
over the next six weeks for interviews and meetings
with constituents on and off campus. The search
committee will make a recommendation to UA
Provost Meredith Hay at the conclusion of the
interviews.

TREO, Phoenix hire Montreal firm to woo California
tech firms to 'Sun Corridor'
Tucson Citizen 2/13/09
Tucson and Phoenix have jointly hired a matchmaker
to find California high-tech companies that may want
to expand to the so-called Arizona Sun Corridor.
Tucson Regional Economic Opportunities and the
Greater Phoenix Economic Council each put up
$25,000 to have Research on Investment, a Montreal
market research firm, generate face-to-face meetings
for both agencies with California companies. TREO
and GPEC leaders announced the "Arizona Sun
Corridor: Open for Business" partnership Thursday
in a video conference from University of Arizona
Medical Center conference rooms in both cities.

Nick Dranias: Deregulation can help solve education
budget crisis
Goldwater Institute/White Mountain Independent
2/13/09
All over the state parents and students are rallying
against proposed budget cuts to Arizona's public
colleges and universities. Instead of focusing ire
at legislators, who are literally between a rock and
a hard place, there's another avenue these newly
minted activists could pursue. For Arizonans
concerned about increasing access to post-
secondary education in our state, why not focus
on loosening up state regulations that are choking
higher education's private sector. Numerous laws
make it a crime to open a private post-secondary or
vocational school in Arizona without state approval.
These laws result in fewer schools and fewer
opportunities for both students and educators.
Legislators could embrace academic freedom
by deregulating private schooling and let the
market work.

Lawmakers hear option of possible new higher
cuts
Associated Press/KTAR 2/12/09 10:47pm
TUCSON, Ariz. - Key Arizona legislators identified
possible budget cut options Thursday that could
approach approximately $390 million for the state-
wide university system. A figure of that magnitude
would be double the $191.5 million in cuts recently
instituted for Arizona State University, the University
of Arizona and Northern Arizona by the Legislature
for the current fiscal year. Those reductions, from
a total of $1.13 billion appropriated for the
universities, helped eliminate the state's $1.6
billion budget shortfall brought on by the crumbling
economy. The universities also get money from
tuition and federal grants. State Board of Regents
President Fred Boice told legislators at a hearing
in Phoenix that possible new cuts would ``cause
severe damage.''

Focus on outcomes, cooperation necessary for
national energy reform, Crow says
ASU Web Devil 2/13/09
An effective energy policy cannot form without drastic
changes in research structure and mindset, ASU
President Michael Crow told the National Press Club
in Washington, D.C. earlier this week. Speaking as
part of a presentation by the Brookings Institution, a
public-policy think tank, and broadcast live over the
Internet, Crow outlined five steps that must be taken
to reform the energy policy in the United States. “We
could find all the money that we could possibly print,
which is what we do with money these days, and
pour it into this problem and it wouldn't actually allow
us … to move in the right direction,” Crow said. The
first step to solve the problem involves what Crow
called focusing on outcomes, not inputs.

Poor K-12 performance due to leniency, Horne says
ASU Web Devil 2/213/09
Leniency for unmotivated students and low standards
have contributed to mediocre performance in the
state’s public K-12 schools over recent years, said
Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom
Horne at his annual State of the State address Thurs-
day. In his presentation to state legislators, Horne was
optimistic about the state’s ability to improve education
in spite of state cuts in education funding totaling $133
million. “Never again in the state of Arizona will parents
get their children up, washed, dressed and eager to
learn and send them to schools where they do not
learn,” Horne said. The state superintendent began
his presentation with a short film comparing the
school system of the U.S. with those of China and
India. American students, Horne said, are given
leniency from teachers and parents who simply
want to send them through to the next grade.

Legislators meet at NAU to discuss education
Inside NAU 2/12/09
Educators met on campus to urge the state House
Education Committee to find alternatives for looming
budget cuts facing education. During the special
meeting, hosted by NAU at its High Country
Conference Center on Feb. 9, education leaders
from northern Arizona asked the committee to seek
revenue generation and business partnerships
rather than implement budget cuts that could
distress their ability to educate students. "Providing
an affordable, accessible and quality undergraduate
residential education is absolutely our core mission,
and we don't want to lose our momentum," NAU
President John Haeger told the committee.

Drill to test readiness for flu pandemic
UA Daily Wildcat 2/13/09
When flu pandemics break out, they can cause
serious illness, economic instability, and even
death among thousands of people worldwide.
More than 400 UA students from various
colleges will participate in a pandemic flu
exercise today at the Arizona Health Sciences
Center in order to be more prepared if such a
outbreak were to occur. Students from the
Colleges of Medicine, Pharmacy, Nursing,
Law and the UA Mel and Enid Zuckerman
College of Public Health will discuss various
disaster scenarios and also learn how to
handle the outcomes of a flu pandemic hitting
Tucson. "We're in the prime flu season so it's
a timely topic," said Dr. Lynne Tomasa from
the UA Office of Medical Student Education.
"It's also something that all of us need to be
aware of … and how we're going to respond."

Tucson Space Scientists Part of New National
Geographic Special
UA News 2/13/09
University of Arizona Regents' Professor of planetary
sciences H. Jay Melosh and Elisabetta Pierazzo, a
senior scientist at the Tucson-based Planetary
Science Institute, are among several scientists
featured in the National Geographic Channel’s new,
three-part special, “Known Universe.” The three-hour
series focuses on the biggest, smallest, fastest and
most explosive things in the universe. It is scheduled
to air on the National Geographic Channel from 6-9
p.m. Tucson time on Sunday and slated to repeat at
the same times on Thursday, Feb. 19. Melosh and
Pierazzo will appear in the a segment on the most
explosive events in the universe. Energy unleashed
by the world's most powerful atomic weapons pales
in comparison with the energy unleashed by earth-
quakes, volcanoes and hurricanes. But even these
devastating natural events would be tiny compared
with what would happen if a 6-mile-diameter
asteroid slammed into Earth.

BIO5’s Chandler talks about going green, sort of
Inside Tucson Business 2/13/09
Plant biology and computer science may not go
hand-in-hand, but a new effort could literally trans-
form a entire field of research. In what was likely
her last lecture as a University of Arizona researcher,
Vicki Chandler, outgoing director of the BIO5 Institute,
explained the effort to collaborate across scientific
disciplines in order to answer questions about her
area of expertise, plant sciences. Last year, the iPlant
Collaborative received a $50 million grant from the
National Science Foundation to bring together plant,
computer and information scientists to create a know-
ledge-sharing database. Although based at the UA,
other institutions, including Arizona State University,
the University of North Carolina and Purdue
University are also involved in the project. Chandler’s
talk Feb. 10 was part of the UA’s weekly lecture series
“Science That Transforms,” which highlights research
projects and innovations.

An option for higher education
Sierra Vista Herald 2/13/09 4:14:43 am MST
More people are seeking higher education in
Arizona, according to numbers provided by the
state’s three universities this week. At the same
time, the universities received $141.5 million in
cuts in the current fiscal year and are looking at
seeing even deeper cuts in the 2009-2010 if the
budget talks at the state Capitol become true. It
is a hard reality for the higher education
institutions that have been attracting more
students. For example, the University of Arizona
estimates it has 35,500 to 35,600 students
compared with 34,737 at the same time a year
ago. Northern Arizona University reported a 5.9
percent growth rate over the past year, and
Arizona State University saw an 1,100 student
increase on its campuses from spring 2007 to
spring 2008. The universities are in the business
of attracting and teaching students. The state’s
universities have continued to be successful at
that.

The Final Stimulus Bill
Inside Higher Ed 2/13/09
As the dust began to settle and details slowly emerged
about the composition of the compromise economic
stimulus bill crafted by Congress (the bill text is now
available, here and here), the picture for higher
education was generally positive — with students and
colleges poised to receive somewhere between $50
billion and $75 billion, based on our rough estimate.
But exactly how it looked very much depended on where
you sat. Administrators at public colleges and officials
in state higher education agencies were probably
relieved that the compromise legislation would deliver
a total of $53.6 billion in new aid to states over the next
two years. That figure is lower than the $79 billion that
was in the House of Representatives’ original bill, and
money that state officials were hoping to get specifically
to renovate education facilities will have to come out of
that total because lawmakers eliminated a separate
pot of money for that purpose. But the compromise
figure is far higher than the $39 billion that was in the
Senate version of the legislation, and $53.6 billion —
$39.6 billion of which is designed to fill gaps left by
state budget cuts, and $8.8 billion of which is set to
go to governors to use for education and other
purposes — should go a significant way toward
softening the impact of the economic downturn on
state colleges and universities.


How the Stimulus Helps You Pay for College
U.S. News & World Report 2/12/09
Experts say the tax credits probably won't help
much, but the Pell grant increase could work. The
government is poised to spend about $13 billion in
stimulus funds on improvements to education tax
credits that will offset up to $2,500 in college costs
for millions of low- and middle-income families.
But the changes probably won't immediately
stimulate the economy or make much of a
difference to the many families now living pay-
check to paycheck, tax experts say. Other education
provisions in the stimulus bill, such as a several-
hundred-dollar increase in the Pell grant, the
biggest federal grant awarded to low-income
students, have won bipartisan support. The
education tax changes are more controversial,
though, and have drawn criticism from some
education organizations for their high costs
and comparatively small impact.

Survey: College vital but less accessible
USA TODAY 2/13/09
The poor economy is ratcheting up anxieties about
college affordability at a time when more Americans
than ever say a college degree is essential to
success, a report says today. Those findings, based
on a survey of 1,009 Americans in late December,
are hardly mind-boggling, but they represent dramatic
shifts in public attitude in a short period of time: •55%
in 2008 said a college degree is necessary vs. 31%
in 2000. •43% in 2008 said there are many ways to
succeed without college vs. 67% in 2000. •67% in
2008 said most people who are qualified for college
don't have the opportunity to attend vs. 47% in 2000.
"These changes are quick given what we usually see
in public opinion (polling)," says John Immerwahr,
senior research fellow for Public Agenda, a New York-
based non-profit that has been tracking attitudes about
higher education since 1993. It conducted this survey
with the National Center on Public Policy and Higher
Education, a non-profit in San Jose that promotes
access.

NSF regional grants conference to be held at ASU
asu-college.com 2/13/09
A National Science Foundation regional grants
conference will be held March 30-31 at Arizona State
University. The conference provides college and
university researchers and educators with valuable
insights into issues, laws and policies concerning
the funding for science programs and research
projects. It is considered a “must” for new faculty,
researchers, educators and administrators looking
for insight into the National Science Foundation
(NSF) funding system. Among the topics to be high-
lighted during the conference are new programs and
initiatives, future directions and strategies for national
science policy, proposal preparation, and cross-
disciplinary and special interest programs.

Northern Arizona University Hosts Connection
Days at the Maricopa Colleges
maricopa.edu 2/12/09
During the week of February 23-26, Northern Arizona
University (NAU) will host “Connection Days” on
several Maricopa Community College campuses.
Students will learn how to earn a bachelor’s degree
from NAU at one of Maricopa’s campuses throughout
the Valley. NAU representatives will be on hand to
discuss local programs and NAU student services,
as well as transfer options to its Flagstaff campus.
NAU is committed to making higher education more
accessible and affordable by partnering with the
Maricopa Community Colleges. In 2006, NAU and
the Maricopa Community Colleges established a
memorandum of understanding that strengthened
the partnership that allows students to easily transfer
from a Maricopa Community College to NAU in order
to complete a bachelor’s degree. NAU has 12 sites
across Maricopa County with an office on each of the
10 Maricopa campuses. The two institutions officially
call the partnership “The Connection,” emphasizing
their cooperation to deliver four-year programming
and student services right on all Maricopa Community
College campuses.