{"id":32091,"date":"2019-11-08T10:52:55","date_gmt":"2019-11-08T16:52:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=32091"},"modified":"2019-11-08T13:08:11","modified_gmt":"2019-11-08T19:08:11","slug":"oklahoma-state-regents-seek-funding-increase-for-higher-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2019\/11\/08\/oklahoma-state-regents-seek-funding-increase-for-higher-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Oklahoma state regents seek funding increase for higher education"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/p>\n

Robby Korth \/ StateImpact Oklahoma<\/p>\n

University of Oklahoma students walk across campus in November 2019.<\/p>\n<\/div>

Oklahoma\u2019s State System\u2019s Regents for Higher Education are asking lawmakers for a $125 million budget increase during the 2020 legislative session.<\/p>

The regents voted unanimously Thursday morning<\/a> to pass a budget request that would increase the state\u2019s appropriation to colleges and universities to $927 million.<\/p>

The request, formally called the system\u2019s \u201cbudget needs,\u201d serves as a wishlist. Historically, state lawmakers have not granted the requests.<\/p>

Between 2008 and 2018, state lawmakers slashed the state appropriation for Oklahoma\u2019s universities and colleges by more than 25% or $265 million<\/a>.<\/p>

Last year, Oklahoma\u2019s higher education system received a bump of $28 million that funded faculty salaries and research.<\/p>

The system had asked for a budget increase of $128 million.<\/p>

But because of the laser focus of this year\u2019s request that includes items like workforce development initiatives, operational cost increases and a concurrent enrollment program expansion, higher education leaders are confident in the budget request\u2019s chances of success.<\/p>

Chancellor Glen Johnson said he and other leaders will push the agenda in the legislature in an effort to boost higher education funding.<\/p>

\u201cWe feel like we\u2019ve got a very appropriate request,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s on us to tee it up, to take it over there and be persuasive and ultimately to take it to the finish line in May,\u201d said Johnson.<\/p>

State agencies, including the Oklahoma Regents for Higher Education, traditionally submit their formal budget requests to lawmakers in the fall. The legislature will consider these requests and the amount of money certified for fiscal year 2021 when they reconvene in February.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oklahoma’s higher education leaders are asking the state legislature for $125 million. In the previous decade state lawmakers have slashed the higher ed budget by $265 million.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":209,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[272,720,1089],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32091"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/209"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32091"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32091\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32097,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32091\/revisions\/32097"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}