OLYMPIA, WA – Starting this fall, the Washington College Grant, hailed as one of the most generous financial aid programs in the country, will decrease by nearly a third for students attending private universities.
A bill under consideration in the state Senate seeks to reverse that.
Last year, Washington lawmakers slashed funding across the board to help close the state’s multibillion-dollar budget deficit. In higher education, the state cut a portion of the Washington College Grant, the state-funded tuition assistance program for students from low to middle-income families.
For students attending public universities, the grant covers full tuition. But for students attending private universities like Gonzaga or Pacific Lutheran University, the state pays a flat amount for tuition, about $9,700 a year. After the cuts, it would be reduced to around $6,500. State funding for tuition at public universities will remain the same.
“Students should be able to make decisions about where to pursue their education without facing unnecessary uncertainty about the support they will receive,” said Sen. T’wina Nobles, D-Fircrest, prime sponsor of the bill.
The “inequitable” cuts are “breaking a promise to students who have been on the road to college since middle school,” Terri Standish-Kuon, president and chief executive officer of the Independent Colleges of Washington, said in a committee hearing last week.
Another program, the Washington College Bound Scholarship, typically provides around $13,000 a year to students attending private institutions. With last year’s cuts, that amount will be reduced to $6,800. Nobles’ bill would restore that funding as well. Students can be accepted into the scholarship program as early as sixth grade.
Two-thirds of students attending independent private, not-for-profit universities are students of color, 65% identify as female and 62% will be the first in their family to earn a degree, according to data from the Independent Colleges of Washington. Two in three of these students are pursuing degrees in high-demand fields.
Restoring the Washington College Grant aid for students attending private schools will cost the state nearly $34 million over the next two fiscal years.
All but two of the 25 people who testified at last week’s hearing supported adding the funding back.
Representatives from the state’s public universities are opposed.
“Unfortunately, there is no bill yet seeking to restore funding cuts to the state’s own universities, whose very purpose is to serve the state,” said Sam Ligon, Eastern Washington University legislative liaison. “It may be naive to believe the states should restore funding to its own institutions first, but that’s my hope.”
Ligon said that public universities are suffering from “hidden cuts” the Legislature took out from the public universities’ general funding budget.
Because of this and other cuts, all six of Washington’s public colleges and universities are in multimillion-dollar budget deficits, said Melissa Beard, director of legislative affairs for the Council for Presidents, an association that represents the schools.
“Before we restore this for the privates, let’s restore at least a portion of the tens of millions that were cut out of the public,” Ligon said.
All told, 3,009 people signed in to support the bill during last week’s hearing, and 23 opposed it. The bill is scheduled for a possible vote Thursday in the Senate Higher Education and Workforce Development Committee.
The House version of the legislation has not been scheduled for a hearing.
Lawmakers are still grappling with a financial shortfall this year, and more cuts are expected.
House Speaker Laurie Jinkins, D-Tacoma, said it’s too early to know whether funding for the proposal will end up in the final budget, but that her alma mater, the University of Puget Sound, “makes a very good case.”
“We’re in a deficit position looking at reductions to a lot of things, trying to save all we can,” Jinkins said. “There are many really good causes and we’re not going to be able to fund them all.”
Diamond Casiano-Reyes, a student at Pacific Lutheran University, told lawmakers in testimony last week that, as a first-generation Hispanic student who comes from low-income parents, it is unrealistic and difficult to acquire a large amount of money to go to university. The state’s financial aid programs made it possible, Casiano-Reyes said.
“It brought me great fear not knowing if I’ll be able to accomplish my dream of becoming a nurse,” Casiano-Reyes said. “I urge you to schedule a vote on bill 5828 and pass it out of committee.”
This story first appeared on Washington State Standard.
