University of Tennessee President Randy Boyd told members of the Senate Education Committee that there are three myths tied to higher education.
Those myths are that no one is going to college, it’s unaffordable, and debt is inevitable.
Boyd said the UT College System has seen total enrollment grow by 7 thousand students over the last five years and it’s planning to increase enrollment from 59 thousand students to 71 thousand students by the year 2030.
“We’ve got to make sure we give those students a great quality education,” said Boyd.
Boyd was one of two university leaders making budget presentations before the Senate committee Wednesday. The UT system is requesting an additional $39 million from the state for fiscal year 2024/2025, including funding to pay for a 3 percent salary increase.
President Boyd says the UT System has a plan to finance new housing for the growing student population but keeping up with classroom space is a challenge.
UT has 298 buildings that are over 60 years old and 60 buildings that are more than 100 years old and that’s led to $900 million in deferred building maintenance.
“That’s putting a lot of pressure on our facilities,” said Boyd. “Just to be able to provide the facilities to keep up with growth requires us to continually invest in our capital to help meet that demand.”
Boyd also refuted what he referred to as the myth that college is unaffordable.
He says the average increase in tuition at UT has been 1 percent over the last 7 years.
“Inflation has been higher than that each of those years, so relatively, it costs less to the University of Tennessee today than it did seven years ago,” said Boyd.
Boyd says 48 percent of UT’s graduates, have no debt and for those students who graduate with some debt the average is $27,000, down roughly $1,000 from 2019.
MTSU facing staffing challenges
The President of Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU) told the Senate committee that teacher retention is a challenge.
Dr. Sidney McPhee said the university is working to fill more than 200 staffing vacancies. MTSU is requesting an additional $10 million from the state, including $3.7 million to fund a 3 percent salary increase to draw in individuals to fill these positions.
“With our current salary levels, we are finding it increasingly difficult to find highly talented individuals to fill these critical positions to serve our growing student population,” said McPhee.
Along with teacher salaries, maintaining MTSU buildings has been a challenge. McPhee says MTSU has more than $150 million in deferred maintenance for buildings.
Safety is another topic McPhee addressed.
He says MTSU intends to use new dollars to increase campus security with better cybersecurity measures.
“The funding in this budget aligns well with the mission and the needs of MTSU and will help our university excel in its ongoing commitment to meeting the educational needs of our great state,” said McPhee. “A college diploma is still the best path to individual prosperity.”
Both budgets received unanimous positive recommendations from the committee.
