Ohio University will receive a 4 percent increase in state subsidies next year, totaling almost $5 million more than the school received from the state this year.
Fortunately
it's just what we budgeted said Bill Decatur, OU's chief financial officer.
OU assumed a 4 percent increase in state funding in the various scenarios being used for budget planning for the upcoming fiscal year, which begins in July. OU will receive about $126 million in state funding next year.
This year, the main channel of state funding is being distributed using a new model which takes both enrollment and performance factors into account. In previous years, the state determined funding based solely on enrollment, with schools that serve a greater number of students receiving more funding.
The new funding model, which was recommended to the governor by Board of Regents Chancellor Eric Fingerhut in January, would split funding 30 percent on performance factors and 70 percent on enrollment.
The performance factors vary for main and regional campuses. Main campuses are funded based on graduating students, keeping students deemed statistically least likely to be retained and meeting university-specific goals outlined by the state.
The new model also shifts more funding towards the STEM line item, which rewards schools for student success in programs focused on science, technology, engineering, math and medicine.
Public two-year and four-year schools will receive more than $1.9 million in total state funding in 2010, up from $1.8 million this year.
Decatur noted that, while the total increase in funding is about 6 percent, the funding to individual schools played out differently than in previous years because the new scheme has a STEM emphasis.
Last year the state guaranteed a 6 percent increase across the board.
The Inter-University Council, a group representing Ohio's four-year public universities, fought to have a stop-loss adjustment included in the new funding model for 2010, which prevents any school from having more than a 1 percent reduction.
There's a strong consensus that you need a formula but do you go in head-first or dive in completely? Decatur said, crediting the council with minimizing the disruption caused by the transition to the new model.
This year, state funding comprised 25 percent of OU's $657.8 million dollar operating budget.
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Wesley Lowery
