Pennsylvania\u2019s State System of Higher Education Chancellor Dan Greenstein delivered Wednesday the annual State of the System address by outlining a bold vision for 2020 and called on strategic partners, especially members of the General Assembly, to choose to invest in affordable and accessible public education.<\/p>\n
The State System is requesting $487 million in state appropriations for 2020-21, a two percent increase over the current fiscal year. And it also is asking state leaders to support a new, separate $20 million investment in a five-year, $100 million project that will redesign some operations, leading to substantial cost savings and new potential revenues.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo what is the state of our System?\u201d Greenstein said. \u201cIt is fluid, and we are at a turning point. This year, with our partners, the General Assembly, we will decide the course of public higher education in this Commonwealth.\u201d<\/p>\n
Greenstein\u2019s 2020 vision includes showing how students at one university can access courses and programs elsewhere in the system; the execution of budget plans to ensure all universities are financially sustainable in five years; leveraging the system\u2019s massive scale of 14 universities and more than 95,000 students to achieve cost savings; and to report out progress meeting clearly identified student and university goals.<\/p>\n
The chancellor pointed out how Pennsylvania ranks 48th<\/sup> in the nation in funding public higher education, calling it a public policy \u201cchoice\u201d made by elected leaders for years. A lack of public investment leads to higher tuition, levels of student debt, and struggles to attract public and private investment.<\/p>\n \u201cThis can has been kicked down the road for many years,\u201d he said. \u201cLet me confirm. There is no more road. The State System bears responsibility for this, yes. But our elected state leaders share that responsibility, and so we ask our partners to collaborate with us, to support our efforts, and set this State System up for Pennsylvania\u2019s success.\u201d<\/p>\n Complementary to the State System\u2019s annual general education appropriation is a new line item request for $20 million to begin a 5-year, $100 million effort to transform the System\u2019s information technology, potential online education, and other office functions by leveraging the System\u2019s massive scale. The State System projects $80 million to $120 million in cost savings alone during the next five to 10 years.<\/p>\n \u201cTransformative change is not a one-time action item,\u201d Board of Governors Chair Cindy Shapira said. \u201cIt requires commitment that stretches years into the future. It requires honesty, vision, and leaders to inspire the work of others toward that vision.\u201d<\/p>\n Pennsylvania\u2019s State System of Higher Education oversees 14 four-year public universities educating more than 90,000 students. The State System offers more than 2,300 degrees and certificates in more than 530 academic areas. The State System universities are Bloomsburg, California, Cheyney, Clarion, East Stroudsburg, Edinboro, Indiana, Kutztown, Lock Haven, Mansfield, Millersville, Shippensburg, Slippery Rock and West Chester Universities of Pennsylvania.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pennsylvania\u2019s State System of Higher Education Chancellor Dan Greenstein delivered Wednesday the annual State of the System address by outlining a bold vision for 2020 and called on strategic partners, especially members of the General Assembly, to choose to invest in affordable and accessible public education.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[143,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community","category-news-release"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19678"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19678"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19678\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19681,"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19678\/revisions\/19681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19678"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19678"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quantum.esu.edu\/insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19678"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}