RobPort

I don't think it's just that they may have wanted it to be public. I've made a lot of public records requests to UND over the years, usually working with Peter Johnson. He's always done a fine job by me. And I say that as someone who has no problem being critical of the universities.

For what it's worth, the Herald's reporting on the feud is what prompted my open records request, which I put in yesterday. The university turned it around promptly which, to their credit, they typically do.

I'll take whatever common ground I can find. ;-)

Ha, well, if you've ever seen my own comments section you know I'm pretty inured to getting "ripped." But I believe in open forums. I take strong and often provocative positions on controversial topics. If I'm going to give the public my two cents, I think they should be allowed to give me their two cents. That's the standard I hold myself to. And hey, we'll just have to agree to disagree on the nickname thing. It's over now, for better or worse. Water under the bridge.

Oh, come now, i'm not that bad am I?

If you read the police report, yes it is who you think it is. And I've been getting emails from him upset that his name was disclosed in the police report. Not my problem though. It's a public record. I posted it exactly as I got it from the state patrol.

Well, there's this little thing called the legislative session going on which is constrained to 80 days by the state constitution. Carlson is the House Majority Leader. He can't exactly jet off to Grand Forks. But Grant Shaft just said on the Scott Hennen Show that they've moved the meeting to Bismarck to accommodate the legislators. So all is good.

I pointed out, accurately, that the universities have a budget of roughly $1.2 billion. This is what Rep. Dosch pointed out as well. Now, the last I checked, the universities existed to serve the people of North Dakota. That's why they were founded, and so the tuition and fees paid when you actually send your kids to the universities are a valid part of the equation. As are the federal tax dollars we pay. Those things combined makes up the lion's share of that $1.2 billion. I put the link to my blog in the signature because I kinda thought that's the sort of thing people do on forums. l link to my posts because I write about this stuff all the time, and my posts are in turn based on my sources. It's handy. I hardly need the readership from this form, which gets about a fraction of the traffic SAB does. I came here because it seemed like folks were interested in this higher education issue, especially as it has manifested itself in this nickname fight. Apparently I was wrong, and I'll bow out. Enjoy the game. I'm not even that much of a hockey fan, but I'm glad to see people waking up to the arrogance of the SBHE.

Right. And Pauline Kael didn't know anyone who voted for Nixon. Yeah, I'm a conservative, and how dare I have an opinion about how our universities are run, I guess. But why do I care about supporting UND? I'd rather see all of these schools support themselves by selling a product (education) to students (customers) who need it. I know that sort of market-driven common sense is distasteful to those in the ivory tower, but subsidized higher education is heading for a big collapse.

So it's ok to be against fiscal irresponsibility at the federal level, as long as we're not slaughtering the higher education sacred cow here in North Dakota? C'mon. Let's have some common sense.

Ha, so the taxpayers who pay the tuition and fees to go to the universities they own don't matter? And are we not federal taxpayers too? No need to get huffy with me. It's pretty clear you don't really understand the issue at hand. There are none so blind as those who will not see, and all that.

Let's talk about K - 12 spending for a moment. Ask yourself why we've seen a 33% increase in spending there despite a 15% decline in public school enrollment. Another sacred cow nobody wants to slaughter.

Well, to be fair, how are going to be able to afford this exhorbitant higher ed spending after oil revenues peak and/or production falters? What if the EPA puts a moratorium on fracking? We're going to regret spending in higher ed willy nilly.

Well, I guess I assume that you actually read the links because all of my sources are linked in the posts. I link my posts because I write about this stuff every single day, and it's ready reference for me. Maybe I'm giving you too much credit for wanting to inform yourself on this subject.

You are. Here's a summary from the University System itself showing their total 2010 - 2011 operating budget as $1.133 billion. http://www.ndus.edu/uploads/reports/32/8-2010-summary-of-2010-11-annual-budgets.pdf Dosch's figure was based on what he is projecting to come out of this legislative session. Despite rhetoric to the contrary from the state's media and the university officials, this legislature will be increasing the budget. Now, to be fair, some of this funding is from non-taxpayer sources. But also note that the total doesn't include hundreds of millions in capital projects that are coming out of the taxpayer's pocket. As for K - 12, you'd expect that to be bigger. Educating what amounts to every single kid in the state vs. college enrollment means a bigger budget. As for health and human services, we have a very elderly population in ND and most of that is Medicaid and other federal programs administered by the state. If you want to go down another dark alley, consider that roughly 41% of our state's budget is federal money. How do you think that's going to shake out as our bankrupt federal government is forced to make cuts?

You asked for a measurement, not an opinion.

Ha, so things like graduation rates don't matter? How about this: Forbes ranked both UND and NDSU, these supposed world-class universities, below 500 nationally. http://sayanythingblog.com/entry/university-of-north-dakota-ranked-as-579th-best-school-in-the-country/ But we never hear about these things, do we? We always hear about new buildings being built and record-breaking attendance. By the way, my personal observations don't matter (and neither do yours) because they are mere anecdotes and not at all useful in a sound analysis based on facts.

Here's a copy of Governor Dalrymple's 2011 - 2013 budget recommendations: http://www.nd.gov/fiscal/docs/budget/executivebudgetsummary2011-13.pdf You can find funding from the previous biennium, combined with the Governor's recommendations (with the legislature is acting on now) for the various aspects of higher ed in the state addressed there. That's where the $1.2 billion figure is from, and it's entirely accurate.

It's a well known fact, not surprising at all to people who actually follow the budges and higher ed issues. Which is a real problem with a lot of this debate in the public. The state's media doesn't dig into anything, instead relying on the higher ed bureaucrats to tell us how it is. And the picture they paint is rosy, outside of needing more money to build their empires. But by all means, please do look into it. I don't think you'll like what you see if you look honestly.

Absolutely. As Rep. Mark Dosch (who sits on the Education and Environment Appropriations Committee) wrote in the Bismarck Tribune earlier this week: http://sayanythingblog.com/entry/north-dakota-higher-ed-doesnt-have-a-revenue-problem-it-has-a-spending-problem/ This is total higher education appropriations. It gets a little confusing, because often when they talk about the higher education budget it's just the university system budget which doesn't always include university-specific appropriations.

I'm not necessarily married to merging the two bodies, though I think it would be a good idea. I'd settle for simply allowing the Governor to fire SBHE memebers when he seems it necessary. That's why we elect these people. To make decisionsike that. And I say that as someone who is less than enamored with Dalrymple.

The existing structure of the sbhe was put in place because of an our of control governor. At the time they saw it as a solution to protect the university from politics. What we've learned since is that the solution isn't to make higher ed isolated from the will of the people. The solution is to not elect crazy governors. We made a huge mistake in 1930 and we should fix it now. We are a state with just 670000 people and a university system that costs well over $1 billion. It makes no sense.

Not sure how you're seeing the merging of two existing departments as an expansion of government. That's a silly argument. It's a streamlining, and much needed.

I have to chuckle at your inane attempts to turn this into something about me. I'm a political commentator, and our universities are a) mediocre and b) sucking up far more tax dollars than they're worth. We have a national problem with higher education. The cost is inflated even as the degrees are devalued. We're heading to a day of reckoning. Our out of control local higher ed bureaucrats are simply accelerating it here.

The only thing that should matter is NDSU's performance. Is the school attracting students, and are those students being educated. Now, in 2008 ND taxpayers spent roughly $71 million on tuition waivers for out-of-state students. If we're having to give the product away for free, there's a problem. Second, let's keep in mind that the four-year graduation rate at NDSU is just 19% (UND ain't much better at 22%). That's abysmal, and it doesn't get much better after even six years when it goes up to just 53% (56% for UND). This, again, speaks the mentality of the university bureaucrats which is build lots and lots of buildings and herd students into them with little regard for outcomes. And we've seen little improvement in these numbers despite pouring a windfall in appropriations onto the universities. We can agree or disagree about what the appropriate level of funding for these universities is, but it's clear that the money they're getting now isn't being spent appropriately. Mostly because the higher education folks aren't accountable to anyone.