Louisiana is one of four southern states contributing to the gap in funding between Historically Black Colleges and Universities and predominately white institutions. The state legislature divided $709.4 million among state universities this past year. HBCUs like Southern A&M College and Grambling State University received substantially less funds than predominately white institutions like LSU. James Minor, assistant professor of Higher Education at Michigan State University, recently completed a study of four southern states, which shows HBCUs often lose out when it comes to state funds and the opportunity to create graduate programs. “The study is simply a way to analyze specific higher education policies relative to the performance of state systems,” Minor told The Daily Reveille. In North Carolina University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill received $490.3 million, and, North Carolina A&T State University, an HBCU received only $88.1 million. In Alabama, the University of Alabama received $532.6 million while Alabama A&M University, an HBCU, received only $44.3 million. University of Mississippi Medical Center received $182.6 million and the top funded HBCU only received $48.9 million. Rep. Donald Trahan, R-Lafayette, said the Board of Regents develops a funding formula to determine the amount of funding each state university receives. The formula is based mostly on enrollment but also includes advanced degree programs and administrative costs; it also leaves room for extraneous costs. In 2007, Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge received $204.8 million dollars from the state legislature while Southern A&M University received only $55.8 million. Minor said the formula should be revised to make it more effective. “I think it should be reformed but not specifically for the reason of providing more funding to the HBCUs but to more effectively optimize the productivity of the system of higher education,” Minor said. “It’s simply that we can more effectively use public funding and higher education to optimize the degree productivity of the state.” Trahan said Southern University in New Orleans has a a substantial amount of funds compared to the amount of students. “Southern University in New Orleans has the largest per pupil allocation of any of our institutions of higher learning,” Trahan said. Trahan said SUNO’s funding is higher than even LSU’s in Baton Rouge. The House’s subcommittee on education determines the amount of funds each university will receive. LSU receives the top funding because of state flagship status, research and high enrollment. But Rep. Kevin Pearson, R-Slidell, a member of the education subcommittee, said the amount of funding received stems from the amount of need presented by universities. “The universities are coming to us with their budget,” Pearson said. “[Division of state funds] is more of a function of what the universities requested.” In his study, Minor indicated that a lack of funding to HBCUs could be risky. He claims HBCUs provide opportunities of higher education to students who would otherwise not attend college. Minor said the institutions that most often cater to minority students are the institutions that receive the least amount of funding and offer the least amount of academic programs. LSU has been making an effort to boost minority enrollment. Pearson said the Appropriations Committee has high hopes for minority enrollment in LSU’s future. “We have noted that a goal is to increase the overall general student enrollment with by two percent over the next couple of years and to increase minority enrollment by 9 percent over the same time frame,” Pearson said. “We would like to see more diversity in not only the student population but also within the instructors.” Jim McCoy, vice provost of Enrollment Services, said black enrollment at LSU is at about 8 or 9 percent, but enrollment services, along with minority affairs, is working to increase this. “We have a very complex recruitment program. It starts with mailing information early on, in a high school student’s career, like the 10th or 11th grade, and working it through to getting them to apply,” McCoy said. “Our Office of Minority affairs puts on a visiting weekend for perspective students and that is very popular.” Minor said minority enrollment in universities like LSU has been stagnant, and with rising standards and costs, it is irrational to believe this will change. “The problem has been that this notion of trying to increase ethnic diversity at LSU or other flagship institutions does not happen,” Minor said. “I think it’s sort of naive to think that as some of them become more selective and expensive [increased minority enrollment] going to happen.”
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