Jay O. Rothman, president of the University of Wisconsin System, speaks during the UW Board of Regents meeting hosted at Union South at the University of Wisconsin–Madison on Feb. 9, 2023. (Photo by Althea Dotzour / UW–Madison)
The University of Wisconsin system Board of Regents approved Thursday a 2025-27 budget proposal that would provide an additional $855 million in state funding to help address ongoing financial issues.
President Jay Rothman announced the proposal early this week, saying it would bring Wisconsin “up to the middle” when it comes to funding nationwide. According to an analysis by the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association (SHEEO), Wisconsin currently ranks 43rd out of 50 states in public funding to support its four-year universities.
“Our taxpayers have supported our institutions and have created great institutions of higher education that we cannot allow to wither on the vine,” Rothman said.
The state’s investment into the UW system has fallen in recent decades. According to the Legislative Fiscal Bureau, about 17% of the UW system’s current funding, or $1.3 billion, comes from state general purpose revenue. In 1985, state general purpose revenue represented 41.8% of the UW system’s budget.
“To win the war for talent, it’s going to take real action to make the Universities of Wisconsin competitive and put us up to the middle,” Rothman told the regents on Thursday.
The push for additional funding in the next budget cycle comes as system schools are dealing with budget deficits going into the next school year and as a total of six two-year campuses have closed over the last two years. The regents also made the decision Thursday to approve a mass layoff of tenured faculty at UW-Milwaukee — a decision made in part because of financial difficulties.
Regent Ashok Rai, chair of the business and finance committee, said while explaining the proposal that the effects of inflation need to be kept in mind. He said most of the initiatives that would be funded are “mission critical.”
The $855 million in additional funding would go towards an array of priorities, including extending the Wisconsin Tuition Promise, which provides free tuition to students from families with incomes less than $55,000; 8% wage increases for UW staff over the biennium; general operations to help universities meet rising costs through state support rather than additional tuition dollars; mental health services, academic and career advising and civil dialogue training; and investments in innovations.
“When we fall behind as a state educationally, we fall behind economically. It is time to reverse this trend,” Rai said.
According to the proposal, the funding would allow the UW system to reduce the reliance on tuition and keep resident undergraduate tuition flat throughout for the 2025-26 and 2026-27 academic years.
“We need that $800+ million from the state, otherwise it’s going to come from… the students, the parents who are already paying their taxes,” Rai said. “We are going to need to do everything on that list one way or the other, so we need the state to participate.”
With approval from the regents, the proposal will now go to Gov. Tony Evers for consideration in his budget proposal. Evers said at a June regents meeting that he plans to ask the state Legislature to increase the system’s funding by more than $400 million in each year of the 2025-27 biennial budget as a way of getting it “back on track.”
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