While other colleges and schools are struggling to make ends meet, Austin Community College is growing, expanding to other Central Texas cities and buying property for new campuses. However, the state cuts are hitting the community college hard as well.
ACC faculty, staff, and students spent Monday morning hearing from one of the finalists for college president.
First and foremost on Sophia Downing's mind is what education cuts will mean for students like her.
“We've been doing surveys surveying the student body, as far as the educational cuts, and how they feel it will affect the students here,” Downing said.
There are three ways that ACC gets its revenue: property taxes, student tuition, and money from the state.
Ten years ago, 40 percent of ACC’s operating budget came from state funding. Today that amount is just 23 percent, and now the school stands to lose even more state dollars.
“It's around $15 million, so it's a significant percentage of our budget, close to about 20 percent,” said current ACC President Stephen Kinslow. “We have not laid off any employees faculty, or staff. We've not furloughed anyone. We've not cut anyone's wages. We've not slashed instructional programs.”
Kinslow says while other universities and school districts are doing massive cuts and layoffs, he and board members decided those steps were too drastic. Instead, ACC plans to cut 10 percent from its administrative budget. A hiring freeze is now in place, certain classes will be larger, and some courses will not offer as many classes during the semester. Students will also most likely end up paying higher tuition costs.
“We have proposed a $5-per-credit-hour increase effective for this summer semester, another $5 increase for fall, and another $5 increase for spring,” Kinslow said.
The cuts mean ACC is also being forced to offer less financial aid.
“So the cuts are really going to affect that group of students,” Downing said.
ACC board members will vote on raising summer tuition costs Monday night.
