Chancellor outlines need for funding partnership

To bring UW–Madison to a more competitive base level of support among its peers in the Big Ten, Chancellor David Ward is proposing to broker a partnership between the state and the university’s alumni and donors.

“We are the benchmark for higher education that many other states would like to emulate,” Ward said during a budget presentation to the UW System Board of Regents June 4. “The challenge is that I hear the locomotives coming down the track after us intellectually. I’m trying to meet the competition early.”

Under Ward’s proposal, approximately $57 million from state tax dollars and tuition would be matched with income from a $200 million to $250 million endowment to be raised by the UW Foundation, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation and other supporters.

The additional public funding — projected over the 1999-2001 and 2001-03 state budgets — would bring the university to the Big Ten median in terms of support per student from state funding and tuition, traditionally the two main revenue sources for public universities.

Those sources have slipped in recent years. Currently, UW–Madison receives $9,350 per student from those areas — $1,900 less than the median in the Big Ten. And in the last two years, spending for higher education in Wisconsin has risen just 3 percent, while the average increase nationally has been 11.5 percent.

The income from the new endowment would enhance what Ward called the university’s “margin of excellence”: the amount of funding from private giving and federal sources that ensures UW–Madison’s position as one of the nation’s outstanding universities. As the percentage of the university’s budget from state funding has declined over the past several years, private giving and federal funds have increased to make up the difference.

“We don’t want to substitute these sources of funding for our core budget,” Ward said.

The chancellor stressed that the urgency to ensure the university’s excellence in the new millennium, rather than a specific dollar amount, is the chief factor in this proposed funding equation.

“I’m not putting a great emphasis on the ($57 million) figure,” the chancellor told the regents. “We need to look at the needs, not the numbers. The figure is meant to help us get a sense of what the discrepancy might be.”

In terms of needs, Ward is targeting five areas for investment: Faculty, to recruit and retain the most talented professors. Ward said these faculty members will not only bring new ideas to their classrooms but also capture federal and private grants and gifts through their research. Academic infrastructure, to bolster libraries, instructional technology and advising, areas the chancellor said are in dire need of increased funding. For example, there was no new money in the 1997-99 state budget for UW–Madison libraries. Research and instructional initiatives, such as the $1.5 million biotechnology proposal funded by Gov. Tommy Thompson this spring. Facilities, to improve energy conservation, reconditioning and preventive maintenance. Examples include the CURB program (Concentrated Upgrade and Repair of Buildings) and the CARE program (Comprehensive Assessment and Refurbishment of Equipment). Financial aid, to help students who are the most in need to pay for their education.

Several regents voiced their support for the budget proposal at the board’s business-and-finance committee meeting.

“I think you’ve done a superb job of identifying the challenge,” said Regent Michael W. Grebe of Milwaukee. “Challenge is the right way to frame it. We now need to stress the collaborative nature to the solution.”

To that end, the chancellor said he will work with the regents over the summer to define the parameters of the funding framework, which ultimately will be decided through the legislative process. The regents will approve their final budget request Aug. 20-21 and forward it to the governor.