Depressing news started to dribble out of the Missouri Department of Higher Education earlier this week. Colleges and universities that participate in the Access Missouri scholarship program learned that the maximum award available to each student is being cut starting this school year.
Access Missouri had been providing annual awards between $1,000 and $2,150 for students who attend a state four-year college or university and between $2,000 and $4,600 for students at private institutions in Missouri. It is the state’s needs-based scholarship program.
Many students who depend on Access Missouri scholarships receive little or no assistance from their parents.
This week, just as tuition-bill notices arrive in students’ in-boxes, the Department of Higher Ed announced that Missouri Access scholarships will be capped at $950 for students at public four-year colleges and universities.
Awards to students at private colleges or universities, meanwhile, will max out at $1,900.
Why did the ax fall at the last minute? The state Legislature provided $82.8 million for the program. But Gov. Jay Nixon cut $50 million as part of massive statewide budget cuts.
Missouri’s Higher Education Loan Authority swooped in with a one-time infusion that restored $30 million to the Access Missouri budget. Yet the program still is down $20 million, and the number of students seeking aid grew sharply — from 86,000 to 102,000.
Faith Sandler, executive director of the Scholarship Foundation of St. Louis, said the “late and disorganized way in which students and families are learning of the cuts is perhaps the most damaging.”
“Both ‘too little’ and ‘too late’ breed bad decisions — dropping out or borrowing too much,” she said.
We asked Mr. Nixon’s communications office what the governor would say to students who have embarked on a college career, partly in reliance on Access Missouri funding, who have worked hard and played by the rules, but whose attendance now is jeopardized by the reductions.
A spokesman observed that Mr. Nixon has defended the budgets of Missouri’s public colleges and universities and, in the process, won a tuition freeze, now in its second year.
In fact, Mr. Nixon effectively jacked up tuition by cutting Access Missouri — not for everyone, just for the students who can least afford it.
Mr. Nixon’s spokesman said “a lot of difficult choices had to be made,” and the governor sees his responsibility as ensuring the state lives within its means.
Cutting the budget isn’t difficult. It’s easy. It might be unpleasant, especially when reneging on promises made to college students.
But all the governor must do is instruct his budget officials to withhold funds.
Then the hardship is passed down the line to the people left to pick up the pieces. In this case, that means college students from low- and moderate-income families who have done all we have asked them to do.
If the governor were to make a difficult choice, he would lead and take some political risks for these kids, rather than just pass the buck.
Mr. Nixon often says that budgets reflect priorities. If fairness is one of the governor’s priorities, he will stick up for Access Missouri students and restore the cut funds — rather than pull the rug out from under students.
