Education Governance Statement

Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of Florida's Education Governance Task Force. I appreciate the chance to testify, to share my thoughts and offer my counsel, as you examine the vital issue of education reform.

The very fact that I have the opportunity to appear before you suggests that this is not a Quixotic mission. This chance indicates that you have not already made up your minds about this vital issue and that my words will not fall upon willfully deaf ears.

During the last week of the regular 2000 session of the Legislature, I called Governor Bush to express my concern about the proposition of abolishing the Board of Regents. He assured me that decision had not been made. In fact, he said he was recommending establishment of a citizens' commission to review the educational governance system, including governance of the state university system, before a final decision was reached.

This body is the result of that commitment not to shoot first and take aim later. I offer my remarks as a method of helping you to establish targets and the direction which Florida and its critical state university system should take in this new century.

That said, I am not here today to invoke nostalgia or resist change.

I too see the need for reform. But I would suggest, based on decades of personal experience in education, that what our state university system needs is to be strengthened at its core. This can best be accomplished through constitutional protection of a statewide governing board for the system. Only with constitutional protection can such a governing board actually work in the way it was designed. Lack of protection has brought us to where we are today ? too close to scrapping a good system because it is not a perfect system.

I come before you in two roles.

I am here as a Floridian who recognizes that governance of the state university system will be one of the most significant decisions by Florida state government of the first quarter of this new century.

Never before has the prosperity of a state been so tied to its academic institutions as it is in this dawning age of information.

States that have established leadership in the new economy - Massachusetts, California, North Carolina - have done so with dominant universities.

Florida has the opportunity to forge this link and become a leading center in the new technology?information economy.

Because Florida lacks an extensive tradition of private graduate and research universities, this opportunity must be seized by our state university system. If our state universities cannot compete with schools in other states, our chance to complement our service and agricultural economy with the new high-tech economy will pass us by.

To achieve this level of excellence, the state university system must be seen as independent, free from inappropriate political interference.

I also offer my testimony from the perspective of a grandparent.

I hope that many of my grandchildren will attend state universities in Florida, as I did. Toward this end, I have purchased pre?paid college tuition contracts for my Florida?born grandchildren. Like many Floridians, I have placed my confidence and financial investment in the quality of the state university system.

Some 600,000 pre?paid contracts have been sold in Florida. In 2002, nearly 50,000 students in Florida will attend either a university or community college using a pre?paid contract.

By the year 2009, when my oldest grandchild reaches college age, more than 80,000 Florida students will be using pre?paid contracts.

If the system continues to improve academically ? as it has in most of the last 35 years ? I will have made an excellent investment in their future. If, however, the system is politicized and resources are dissipated; if quality administrators and faculty cannot be attracted or retained, then I will sadly recommend that my grandchildren forgo public universities in Florida ? even with their tuition paid ? and go elsewhere for their college education.

Again, the governance of the system will be critical to the capability of individual universities to sustain a level of excellence.

Dr. Clark Kerr was president of the University of California system from the 1950s to the end of the 1970s. It was during his tenure that the system made its leap from good to arguably the best university system in the world. When asked why there had been such progress in a brief quarter of a century, Dr. Kerr replied that the people of California had been willing to support the university system because they identified their futures and that of their families, with the success of the university system.

The success of Floridians and their families is no less dependent on the fate of their state university system.

In spite of this symbiotic linkage between the state university system and the future of Floridians, the university system has frequently been out of favor and under assault by political elites. These attacks have been bipartisan: Democrats as well as Republicans have attempted to intrude politically in the operations of the state university system.

When their attacks were rejected, frequently the response was to try to blow up the system by changing the very structure of governance that allowed its independence.

Historical context

Perhaps it provides comfort to know that our state has wrestled with this issue of education governance before. And further, that the system of individual institutional boards now being considered by this Task Force was the governance structure which Florida chose for the 19th Century.

Our history of statewide university governance covers nearly a century. At the end of the 19th Century, Florida was supporting seven small institutions of learning, most of which were governed by local boards.

In 1903, the Legislature authorized an eighth school, the Florida Agricultural Institute, in Osceola County, which would have duplicated the Florida Agricultural College in Lake City. With the creation of a statewide governance system, the duplicative institute was never established.

In 1905, the Legislature and Governor Napoleon Bonaparte Broward were fed up by the competition, duplication and inefficiency, prompting Governor Broward to send the following message to the Legislature:

"In my judgment, the needs and requirements of these institutions can never be intelligently and properly considered until an efficient system of management, control "and supervision over them is provided."

The Legislature acted, creating the Board of Control. While the Legislature and the Board of Control sparred on and off for decades, the system essentially stayed in place until the 1960s.

There were two primary catalysts for change. The first catalyst for change to our modern governance structure was inappropriate political intervention into academia, most notably by the Johns Committee.

The Florida State Senate, in 1956, appointed a committee to "investigate all organizations whose principles or activities include a course of conduct on the part of any person or group which could constitute violence, or a violation of the laws of the state."

The committee's leader, Senator Charley Johns of Starke, steered the group to investigate the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, hoping to find a link to
communism.

Chairman Johns then turned his attention to investigating homosexuals on college campuses. For nine years, the Johns Committee and its investigators coerced hundreds of witnesses to testify about their private lives, calling professors and students from classes to question them for hours. More than 39 college professors and deans were dismissed at three state universities; 71 teaching certificates were revoked.

Mr. Chairman, I respectfully request that a summary of a documentary produced at the University of Florida on the Johns Committee be entered into the record of this proceeding.

Floridians recognized that the intrusions of the Johns Committee into academic freedom had a devastating effect on Florida's capacity to build a quality system of state universities. The Board of Control had been an ineffective defender of academic freedom.

To provide additional historical context, Florida was not alone in creating statewide coordination of its education system as a buffer between politics and academics.

Georgia's statewide board was created in the wake of Governor Eugene Talmadge's blatant politicization of the universities, including his 1941 dismissal of several educators who had advocated racial equality.

Mr. Chairman, a second catalyst occurred in 1961, when President John F. Kennedy announced that our national goal was to land a man on the Moon and to return him safely to earth.

In 1962, the Board of Control authorized a study of education needs in East Central Florida, "The Space Coast, "and the statewide system to better serve the emerging needs of space science.

The Space Era Education Study produced a series of recommendations -- in 1963 -- that led to expansion of our public universities' role in space and technology. But this report also issued scathing criticism of political interference in Florida's education structure by the Cabinet Budget Commission.

I quote from the 1963 report of the Space Era Education Study: "An imposed routine of political flavor, delay, intrusion of wholly extraneous factors, and depreciation of higher education is present in one form or another in practically every aspect of the state's daily operations in higher education."

The reform that followed was creation of the Board of Regents. In the first major overhaul since 1905, the Legislature replaced the Board of Control with the Board of Regents, extending members' terms from four to nine years, and establishing as its appointive chief operating officer a strong chancellor.

Former Chancellor Robert B. Mautz described the need for regents this way: "The Board of Regents is designed to bring balance, order and rational educational decisions to the competing demands of individual institutions."

The longer terms were subject to voter approval in the general election of 1964. With overwhelming support, the Board of Regents became effective January 1, 1965.

The Tampa Tribune called this development: "one of the most significant actions ever taken by the legislators and people of Florida in behalf of higher education."

Board of Regents Reorganization

As we begin a new century, we once again examine the critical issue of governance of our state universities. Some of the same issues that prompted actions nearly a century ago seem as relevant today as then.

There are myriad questions that flow from the possible abolition of the current Board of Regents. I would like to submit a list to the record of 10 questions about the practical effect of abolishing the Board of Regents.

In the time I have before you, I would like to focus on three such questions.

One, how do state universities interact with the federal government?

Two: How do we differentiate the roles of our public universities?

and . . .

Three, how to protect academic from political intrusion?

State universities in Florida ? Federal relations:

The overall relationship of public universities to government ?? state and federal ?? is a worthy topic for thorough examination. As a United States Senator, I will focus on the federal side of government relations.

From the federal perspective, a unified approach is superior to having 10 public universities competing against each other, sending conflicting signals to Congress and national agencies.

Respected state universities and the systems they belong to have strong partnerships with the federal government, including Florida.

The existence of a strong statewide governance structure has been a critical component of this success. High standards of grant proposals, the mitigation of inter?institutional competition, creative collaborations among Florida universities have been the result of effective Board of Regent leadership.

A premier example of all of these forces at work for Florida is the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory. Better known as "Mag Lab," this is a collaboration involving Florida State University, the University of Florida and Los Alamos National Laboratory.

In a peer?review competition in 1990, these institutions, working together, received a National Science Foundation contract, relocating the Mag Lab from the Cambridge, Massachusetts campus of MIT to Tallahassee. This successful project has just received its third National Science Foundation contract. In total, the Mag Lab is slated to receive a total of 171 million federal dollars through 2005.

Overall, awards from the National Science Foundation to members of the State University System have more than tripled in the last decade (from $18.8 million in 1990 to $65.6 million in Fiscal Year 2000).

Grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to our State University System more than doubled since 1990 ($44.6 million in 1990 to $99.2 million in 1999).

The major federal research funding agencies have recognized the comparative advantages which the Florida statewide governance system has achieved

Mr. Chairman, I respectfully ask to submit to record a January 3, 2001 letter from the director of the National Science Foundation regarding her view of Florida's success in competing in a rigorous merit review process.

(Insert letter from Rita R. Colwell)

Senator Connie Mack and I have followed the practice of submitting all requests from Florida state universities for federal funding to the Board of Regents for evaluation and prioritization. The Board of Regents' support has given us the reassurance that individual campus requests were statewide in importance.

With this confidence we were able to aggressively advocate on behalf of our state universities. The results have been impressive.

In the fiscal year that ended on September 30, 2000, Florida's 10 state universities received $67.5 in congressional appropriations. This year, congressional appropriations have soared to $100 million.

Attached is a summary of fiscal year 2001 appropriations for each of the state universities.

There is no benefit to adoption of a provincial governance structure and indeed, a substantial risk of harm in fracturing the federal -Florida state university system relationship that is working so well.

Differentiation of mission

Florida has a particularly difficult challenge in assuring that all Floridians have an opportunity for access to a quality university program. Unlike most large states, we have no intermediary set of institutions ? such as state or public municipal colleges ? between our community colleges and state universities. Thus, the statewide governing board must be responsible for assessing state needs and allocating and sustaining programs at the most appropriate universities to meet these needs. Failure to do so would result in overlapping programs, internal squabbling, and finally, a system of pervasive mediocrity. Florida would be returning to the pre-Board of Control 19th century, and quite likely, to the same debilitating consequences.

But, it is in exactly this function of differentiation of mission ? institutional and by academic programs ? that the Board of Regents has been most tested, assaulted, abused and now in danger of extinction.

Florida is a low tax state and every indication is that it will remain so. As such, Florida cannot afford to grant to each university what the university or its advocates in the legislature desire. There must be statewide planning and control.

Over the past 35 years, the Board of Regents has with few exceptions fulfilled the differentiation of missions functions. Governors and a majority of legislators have respected the Board of Regents and used the Regents' reputation for academic planning and professionalism to resist efforts by their constituents to funnel resources to a favored institution.

We are now in a different era.

In the last few years, the Board of Regents was asked to evaluate proposed professional programs including new law and medical schools.

In keeping with its responsibility to differentiate missions, the Board of Regents evaluated the programs and decided against them.

First the 2000 Legislature overrode the Board's considered, professional judgment. Then ? as if to ensure this could never happen again ? the Legislature executed the Board of Regents altogether.

We should all cringe at the message this action will send to future university governing boards ? be they statewide or school?specific ? about offering an honest opinion.

Political Interference

We mentioned the Johns Commission as an historic backdrop for creation of the Board of Regents.

But none of us are naive enough to believe that the temptation for political meddling in academia was halted in the 1960s.

Unfortunately, Florida has had a history of gubernatorial and legislative intrusion.

These actions have been bipartisan; Democrats and Republicans have been guilty.

One of Florida's legislative leaders in education has been Senator Jack Gordon. A hallmark of Senator Gordon's long and distinguished career in the Legislature was his deeply held view that state resources should flow to the population centers, such as Miami, rather than universities in more remote locations, such as Gainesville or Tallahassee.

This premise prompted Jack Gordon to take a strong interest in the appointment of a president at Florida International University. The university chancellor at the time, Dr. E.T. York, opposed the candidate who was backed by Senator Gordon.

Through another member of the Florida Senate, Senator Buddy MacKay, Senator Gordon sent this message to Chancellor York: If you endorse my man for president of FIU, I'll get off your back.

Chancellor York told Senator MacKay; "You tell Jack Gordon to go to Hell."

At this point, Buddy MacKay chuckled, and said: "E.T., if you'd said anything different, I would have been disappointed in you."

Friends, I have great respect for Jack Gordon, and Buddy MacKay and E.T. York. But this example raises core questions: Do we want a state university system shaped by political deals? How do we insulate academia from politics? Do we want politicians to pick our university presidents?

In 1980, the Legislature voted to abolish the Board of Regents - for reasons that had little to do with education and a great deal to do with personalities and personal university loyalties.

I vetoed that legislation and request permission to submit a copy of my veto message for the record.

The temptation of legislators to cross the line of academic freedom is still present. On December 22, 2000, The Miami Herald reported that two legislators had threatened to withhold state funds from the University of Miami, half of which funds are for the University of Miami first?in?Florida medical school. Why? They were displeased with the University Board of Trustees selection of the former president of the University of Wisconsin ? Madison campus ? and current secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, Dr. Donna Shalala, as the new president of the state's largest private university. If private institutions can be threatened in this way, our public universities don't stand a chance of independence without a strong buffer from politics.

In each of these three critical, but fragile areas: federal relations, differentiation of functions; and protection of academic freedom, the Board of Regents has served the citizens of Florida well, and frequently courageously.

What, therefore, is the problem with the current system?

Some would say it is the failure to work more closely with and to be more sensitive to the wishes of the Governor and the legislature.

That, I submit, should more accurately be viewed as a success. When the people of Florida in 1964 said they wanted a more politically independent statewide governing board they were rejecting the Johns Committee and excessive political interference. The creation of the Board of Regents was reform, not regression.

That is not to say that the current system could not use fundamental reform. It is by no means perfect. It should not be viewed as untouchable. Solid, well-considered and fundamental reforms are needed.

As well as it has served, a combination of factors which have emerged since 1964 require even more armoring of the Board of Regents from political interference.

Governors can now stand for reelection. The Legislature is organized as single member districts and members are term limited.

Thus, I urge you to recommend to the Legislature of 2001 a constitutional amendment which will be submitted to the people in November 2002. I request permission to insert a copy of this proposed amendment into the record. This constitutional amendment would do the following:

* The amendment would make our state university system a constitutional entity, with specific reference in Article IX.

* This system would be governed by a 13?member board of Florida citizens, appointed by the governor, confirmed by the state Senate, including the commissioner of education and a student. Terms would be no fewer than eight years, staggered to provide stability between changes in administrations. The student member would serve a one?year term.

* The system would be funded by the Legislature via lump?sum appropriations to two categories: operating and capital.

A legislatively submitted constitutional amendment could be done in a single initiative. If the people were given their vote through a referendum, it would be submitted for two votes by citizens:

One vote could determine the structure of the statewide governing board, and a second on the lump?sum appropriation for the university operation and capital needs.

Providing constitutional status to the Board of Regents is critical to assuring its ability to protect academic freedom and to improving its capacity to rationally allocate programs, responsibilities and dollars to state universities based on statewide priorities.

Mr. Chairman, when I was governor, the single most vexing problem in the governance of the state university system was the extent to which the Legislature sought to manage, or micro?manage, the state university system through the details of the budget process.

The temptation for political interference existed under a Democratic Legislature and continues under a Republican Legislature. Constitutional status for and lump sum funding to the Board of Regents will dramatically reduce this political interference.

This structure would allocate resources to various universities based on considered judgments and statewide priorities. This process, lump-sum funding, would allow the Legislature to perform what many management experts clamor for: analyses of outcomes.

If the Legislature is involved in crafting budgets for each public university, then how can the Legislature hold those universities accountable?

How can a participant also be an objective critic?

Under the reform we propose, the Legislature would be able to step back, and hold the universities accountable. Our reform would do away with the legislative spoils system.

You may or may not conclude my suggested constitutional amendment has merit. Regardless, I submit you should allow the people of Florida to make the ultimate determination. Your recommendation to the Legislature should ensure that the voters have the right to choose whatever governance reform of our state university system they consider most appropriate.

·The stakes are that high. Few decisions will have a greater effect on Florida's economy, culture and future as will the structure of the state university system.

·There is ambiguity as to whether the 1998 constitutional amendment extended the supervisory authority of the State Board of Education to the state university system.

Allow me to share with you the considered legal opinion of respected attorney William C. Cramer. Mr. Cramer served on the Education Commissioner's Blue Ribbon Committee on Education Governance and was appointed by Governor Bush to serve on the Board of Trustees of the Gulf Coast Community College. In 1998 Mr. Cramer was asked by the Commissioner of Education to prepare an analysis of the actions of the Constitutional Review Commission related to the change in the constitution affecting the State Board of Education.

"The intent of the Constitutional Revision Commission is explicit and unambiguous," Mr. Cramer wrote. "The new state board of education is to supervise the free public schools system, and its jurisdiction should not extend to the postsecondary system."

On the concluding page of his analysis Mr. Cramer again stresses this point writing "Controlling rules of constitutional interpretation lead ineluctably to the same conclusion:The new board of education should have supervisory power over free public education, that is pre-K-12, but not over the community college or state university systems."

·The implications of change on fundamental issues like prudent use of public dollars and protection of academic freedom from political interference are enormous. As well, there are practical issues of multi?institution collective bargaining, system wide capital financing, admissions policies and effects on the over half million young and aspiring Floridians with pre paid college tuition contracts. All of these would benefit by the thorough and public debate consideration of a constitutional amendment would allow.

·California is today reeling from a deregulation of its electric utilities. This plan was hurriedly thrown together four years ago. Few of the parents of California's utility deregulation are now willing to claim paternity. I fear that a restructured provincialized state university system, assembled in the political hot house of the 2000 legislature, will soon be a similar orphan.

However, the damage of unexamined haste to our citizens and the reputations of those who will be held accountable will be much more serious and difficult to unravel than fixing a light bill.

·But most important, a public debate on the future of our state university system would inevitably be a public debate on the future of Florida. Governor Jeb Bush has recognized the divisions which have split our state and asked for a period of unification.

During his December 18 fireside conversation with the people of Florida Governor Jeb Bush.

"Now it is time to begin the process of re?building a state where deep divisions exist. These divisions cross partisan and racial lines. One person alone cannot heal them. One person cannot heal a nation. All of us must refocus the terrific energy that is Florida by ensuring that we re?build our political and electoral structures, so no one feels dis?enfranchised . . . so that all of us feel confidence in our system of elections . . . so that we can move beyond politics to possibilities for a better and brighter future."

I can think of no better process of healing our scars than to respectfully include the people of Florida in the determination of our shared interest and future in the state university system.

And I can think of no issue that so unites Floridians from all walks of life and all corners of the state as does education. Florida's parents want their children to have access to the finest academic thought. Florida's students - whether they're just finishing high school, or in the middle of their careers - want the opportunity to pursue their dreams.

A decision that touches the lives of this many people cannot be made carelessly or taken lightly. A decision of this magnitude must be examined from every angle, pros and cons explored, arguments considered and reconsidered.

Thank you for your patience and your attention.

Our state university system is our future. It can be our entree into the new economy and the foundation for our success. We can pick up this golden ring, or we can leave it on the table. The choice is yours.

back to HotTopics