From Senator Seth Harp:
“Merging Historically Black Colleges such as Savannah State University and Albany State College with nearby white-majority schools, Armstrong Atlantic State University and Darton College, will save our taxpayers and the state a significant amount of money. It is not my intention to close any of these institutions, but to strengthen them and make them better. HBCUs should keep their historical significance. This suggestion will require research, but now is the time to examine cost-saving solutions in this tight economic climate.
Savannah State University was created by statue to service black students. Combining schools will eliminate the need to compete for community support. If we merge these institutions, we can make them more fiscally sound and even more successful. My goal as chairman of the Senate Higher Education Committee is to ensure schools in Georgia are of high quality so that our students can receive diplomas of academic excellence.
Georgia is currently experiencing severe economic times due to a substantial budget shortfall and is not expected to recover until 2010. Merging 14 of Georgia’s technical colleges eliminated administrative costs and have already shown significant savings. Combining certain schools will reduce overhead costs, and strengthen the learning opportunities offered to each student. We must take the necessary steps to ensure the success of those who choose to attend institutions of higher learning.”
It is absolutely worth opening this can. There is no reason to keep historic X colleges of any kind if merging schools to save money makes sense.
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I agree we should also promote the joint enrolment program for vocational/tech based students while in high school and middle school. And let the vocational/tech school create the needed curriculum for high school students on this track. This would give the students a great marketable life skill, save the tax payers money on buildings and teachers while matching students’ with the best teachers.
No.
Why don’t we start with the boat ramps before we start discussing eliminating institutions which not only produce but have a legacy that should arguably be preserved.
Good point on priorities, Grift. Boat ramps would be a good first start. But I think we eventually do need to get to culling the number of institutions.
So kill the historically black ones first? Are you guys intent on handing state government back to the Democrats?
Why not do on a performance basis instead?
I don’t see a problem with merging institutions that are in the same geographic proximity. No one needs to kill the historically black colleges. I know nothing about the four schools listed (UGA doesn’t play them), but I see no reason why the “white” schools can’t be folded into the historically black ones. With every major institution having multiple satellite campuses these days, why have the overhead of totally separate schools?
I say go further. Merge Clayton state and Ga perimeter college. Might as well throw that new gwinnett school in there as well.
I say go further.
Merge every school under the banner of Emory. All football teams would be undefeated, the state wouldn’t have to fund the schools, and every college in Georgia would immediately become prestigious.
Sounds like a winner to me.
I’m in favor of merging historically black boat ramps with majority white boat ramps.
There aren’t enough ugly girls in this state for that, rugby.
I heard that GT is opening up a branch location in Athens.
Merge on a performance basis. Those that can’t meet standard performance metrics should be merged.
I think it is insulting to suggest closing the HBCU’s and merging them with other institutions.
Few things at least pertaining to Darton/Albany State:
1. Darton is now 50/50 white/black, which reflects demographics of the area. (just to clear that up)
2. Merging Darton/ASU would not save taxpayers a significant amount of money b/c the campus at Darton would have to stay open b/c of all the students they serve.
3. Many students who start out at Darton are there b/c they cannot get into a 4 year University. The Board of Regents has mandated that students have a certain SAT score before they can go to a 4 year school or 30 hours of classes. 70% of the students at Darton start out with remedial courses, due to lack of college prep., and are not even eligible to go to a University.
4. Further, Darton offers a cheaper education to more students (they have more students than ASU) and it would only be increasing the tuition of students who can’t afford to go to ASU, which would be very unpopular since there is already going to be another tuition increase this year.
5. I’m sure if these issues are going on there, then they are probably prevalent elsewhere, but does it really matter b/c I seriously doubt this will ever happen, but yes if tried it would be a “can of worms.”
How’s that minority outreach program going for the GOP so far?
All I can say about this is “Oy vey!”
What kind of criteria are we using here? I believe it is …”if merging schools to save money makes sense.”
To save money we could eliminate kindergarten. We could eliminate all new road construction. How about we eliminate the death penalty, and save all that money that goes into fighting the appeals? Decisions about spending and government are not all about saving money, yet the GOP seems to believe that if it saves money, it is worth doing. Come on people, you have to have a better criteria than just saving money. Anything and everything can be justified for that reason.
Government functions are almost always important and necessary functions that affect the health, safety and economic welfare of people and business in the state. These functions need to performed well. We don’t want the sanitary sewers to work most of the time. We want them to work all the time.
We have a revenue problem in this state and we have a state government that has burrying it’s head in the sand. Take transportation, every state in the country except Tennessee spends more on a per capita basis on transportation than Georgia. Our traffic sucks in metro Atlanta, and the half of the state is crying about not having their four-lanes complete. We have a 60 percent high school dropout rate from high schools, and we are nearly last in SAT scores. How the hell are we going to compete in a global economy with a lackluster labor pool and a declining transportation system? There are solid business reasons to invest in education and transportation. The return on investment will come from more jobs and a higher state domestic product. State government under Republican rule is scared to death of spending more even if it makes economic sense. I believe that is penny wise and pound foolish.
The governor has placed an emphasis on efficiency. Shall we assume that Republican management has eliminated the bloat in state programs? If he has been successful then we must conclude that the spending we are doing is necessary and efficient. If the current programs are appropriate and well managed, we need to consider the revenue side of the ledger. Meanwhile our tax system hasn’t been overhauled in 50 years.
We are losing ground under the GOP. The quality of life is declining in Georgia along with education and transportation.
I too could save money by owning my slaves, instead of paying them wages.
It is not always about money.
However, I’ve never heard of a ‘white college’ before. Perhaps it is time to realize those bandaids to racism should be yanked off because that wound had healed a few years after Brown v Board.
Do it for the right reason.
Rick,
Google Brigham Young University sometime when you’re bored.
Rick,
Did you miss the Historically part in the Historically Black University and Colleges.
Don’t make this about something it isn’t. The idea is insanely foolish enough on its own.
I understand the “historic” part. You can just as accurately insert “appeasement”. My point mirrors most others in the thread, merge on merit, not on black/white/funding issues.
Sorry, Ick the correct answer is Mormons, who are the Mormons. I discriminate solely on the Christian Wacko Factor Scale™
But your point is taken.
Oh, right you are Progressive Dem because under Democrat leadership, Georgia was #1 in education and we didn’t have to worry about things like the Speaker of the House completely reorganizing school ranking so his daughter’s debate team wouldn’t have to compete (and lose constantly) to private schools of the same size.
No, that never happened in the good old days of Democrat governance. 6 years of a GOP governor and we’re still trying to undo 150 years of Democrat stupidty. Let’s not forget your enlightened Jim Crow brethern who made HBCUs necessary in the first place. Separate but Equal, the motto of the Georgia Democrat Party for the vast majority of its existance.
Come on Progressive Dem, why not get out some fire hoses for old time sake and honor your proud and glorious party.
Grift, I assume they’d merge into the historically black colleges, not the other way around.
And that’s better why Erick? Because they’re all the same?
Seriously. You think a budget solution is to eliminate historically black schools before touching anything else (such as say Icarus plan to merge Clayton State and Georgia Perimeter).
I’m just curious . Did the brilliant person who came up with this plan think this was politically a winner or ideologically a winner or are there just more dope smoking Republicans that I ever thought.
Icarus,
As a Clayton State grad–I’m not a fan of seeing them merge with GA Perimeter for the same reasons Melb described mostly because they’re Clayton’s feeder school.
I may be biased but Perimeter shouldn’t be treated as equals as a potential merger would imply.
To that end, I’ve seen Perimeter students come to Clayton and it takes them at least a semester or two to catch up because they are so far behind academically.
I’ll also add that it’s extremely easy to get in to Clayton State but you must work hard to leave with a degree–when I was applying the SAT score was 780 (on the old 1600 point scale) to get in.
I’d suggest Gwinnett Tech instead as a partner to GA Perimeter because they share the same focus and potential pool of students.
One last point,
I mentioned the 780 minimum because how bad of a student do you have to be not to be able to beat that and as a result have to go to Perimeter to establish a GPA to transfer in to Clayton State.
My point is that those two year schools are for those who can’t cut the mustard academically and shouldn’t further dilute the bottom half of the student base on their way to being flushed out.
As I recall, Senator Seth Harp once said he does not know how to work on a computer. Until it is verified he has that knowledge, I would suggest that he refrain from poking his nose into what goes on in state colleges.
Is there someone with some graphic skills that could work on this GA Ga Tech Merger? I’m not sure what a Bull Jacket would even look like.
Progressive Democrat
We are facing a fiscal crisis because many on both sides want cake without the price. The gut issue politics on both sides should be set aside to solve problems.
The reality is we have under-utilized asset. Why would increasing utilization hurt the students? On the right we have politicians more interested in symbols like the Ten Commandments in the court houses instead of equal justice for all. And on the left we have people like you more interested in keeping a symbolic black University than access to a quality education.
Both sides would rather use the issue like this to motivate the base rather than solve the problem.
The real victims are the students and society for creating drop outs who more than likely will end up being a drag on society. Can we not put aside race, religion, party for the greater good?
Progressive Dem,
I think what you’ll find with these Republicans is a basic contempt for anyone who works in public service or uses public services. It isn’t just education that getting axed, its also mental health, law enforcement, the courts, DFCS. With a less than 2% shortfall this fiscal year, agencies have been asked to cut up to 10% when they are already not capable of providing critical services. The Governor is kicking disabled vets to the curb, but still building his boat ramps. All we hear is “the sky is falling! the sky is falling!” But all that is is a distraction from the fact that the entire infrastructure of this state is imploding around them. At least, when they quit offering any type of services, we’ll be ever so much more “efficient”.
FOR ARGUMENTS SAKE: There are 7 HBCUs in Georgia. Three are public (Savannah State, Fort Valley and Albany State) and four are private (Spelman, Morehouse College, Morehouse School of Medicine and Clark Atlanta) – not sure if Morris Brown is actually open anymore but it would be considered private if it is.
My point is that there are a profound number of institutions in this state. How much can the state actually save by merging two HBCUs with two other institutions. I would think you’d want to look in the metro area first where there is a plethora of opportunities for more beneficial mergers.
I’m not convinced this idea is the most cost efficient. I think it’s just easier to “think” that merging two small schools is going to make a difference. Why not let GA Tech, UGA and Georgia State be the umbrella schools for Gwinnett, Clayton, Perimeter, Kennesaw, etc. Downsize the staff and administration at these smaller schools and give the land grant institutions all the administrative duties.
PERSONAL THOUGHTS: No one wants to see their schools merged with any other institutions b/c the historic value is bound to get lost over time (at least that’s what any HBCU alumni would say). Meaning, the history and creation of these schools and the efforts to keep them open and operating.
I know it doesn’t “seem” like a big deal but it truly is. My personal example is that my mother attended South Carolina State University, an HBCU in South Carolina. =) She was a freshman on campus in 1968 when the Orangeburg massacres occurred. She was a demonstrator and saw others shot. She and my grandfather were just discussing this tragedy over the summer when a PBS special about it was showing. All of this to say, the word “historically” in historically black colleges and universities speaks volumes on the struggle for freedom and opportunities and the development of mature, educated and ambitious blacks and minorities in American history.
Come on Progressive Dem, why not get out some fire hoses for old time sake and honor your proud and glorious party.
All due respect, did you miss they day they went over historical political realignment in the South in Political Science 101?
Yes.
It’s very easy to do as a Republican.
This is a great idea. Let’s start by merging Georgia State into Morehouse.
Dorian
You post reminds of the psycho babble debate between Democrats and Republicans on No Child Left Behind.
Democrats think we need to throw more money at a failed idea. And Republicans think all we need to do is pound square pegs harder into round holes!
At the end you seem more interested in the fight than solving the problem.
JK
My post is not about HBCU, nor rallying the base. The point is that state government under GOP leadership reflexively looks to cut spending without considering the long-term consequences. Georgia has structural problems delivering education and transportation. Of course we want to be as efficient as possible, but we are not going to “save” our way into fixing these problems. The current leadership has taken increased spending off the table, and hasn’t addressed the structural issues. Education and transportation are at the foundation of our economic system. Transportation and and education are declining in quality and not competitive with other states and regions. Ignoring these problems is detrimental to current and future citizens and businesses. The state must also re-examine its revenue structure to match up with the 21st century economy.
Konop you remind me of Nixon only with less charisma. Did you even sign up for that Dale Carnegie course like I suggested? I’ll send you a free copy of ‘How to Win Friends and Influence People’ for Christmas if you promise to read it.
Progressive Dem
You can throw all the money you want at the problem, but unless you fix No Child Left Behind system that incubates failed policy like MATH 123 you are just kidding your self!
Some of us here on the right generally don’t lay awake at night thinking of ways to “centralize” everything. And since when are schools supposed to be money saving ventures? And where’s the study suggesting that mergers would save money? And aren’t the students and their parents taxpayers too? How would they save money? This looks like the State version of NCLB. My only question is who’s the textbook publisher trying to get in on the deal.
Neocons never saw a merger or acquisition they didn’t like in the public OR private sector. Or one they couldn’t make money on.
JK
Oh, so the state’s hands are tied on education because of NCLB??? You must be kidding. Nothing can be done? That’s a lame excuse for inaction. Many states have successful public education systems.
I was expecting for someone to use the phrase “throw money at it” – a hackneyed and reflexive defense for any and every government spending issue that presumes that the spending is wasteful. You also ignored the transportation problem.
Jmac, Georgia was solidly Democrat on the local level when I went through political science. I also learned from Dr. Charles Bullock in the mid-1990s that the reason Georgia was slower coming over to the GOP was thanks to the Jimmy Carter Presidency and the growth in the GOP in Georgia was due more to northern, Mid-western Republicans moving into the Atlanta suburbs than a whole-sale switch to the Party of Lincoln by those who disagreed with the 1964 Civil Rights Act (CRA) and the 1965 Voting Rights Act (VRA). In 1964, Bo Calloway was the only Republican elected to Congress in GA. He was gone by 1967. Newt came in 1978, 14 years after the Civil Rights Act.
Pat Swindall wasn’t far behind, but represented one of those suburban districts. By new, 2 decades had passed since 1964 and Tom Murphy was still Speaker.
1992 added Linder (we’d lost Swindall because he lived up to his name) and Kingston. We are now almost 30 years since the CRA and VRA.
In 1994, Georgia went like the rest of the county, hard to the GOP. You can’t pin a national trend on Civil Rights. Why did the GOP do so well in states like NY that year if the 1964 CRA was the reason?
Still, Democrats held onto the Gov. Mansion, State House and Senate. We had a split US Senate delegation. Except for Sam Nunn, no white Democrats served in the US Cong. from GA. It would be 38 years after the CRA for the first Republican Governor to be elected. We got the Senate that year ONLY because several Democrat switched.
On the 40th anniversary of the CRA, the GOP took the House in GA. A 21 year old new voter in 1964 was now 61 and getting ready for retirement at this point. Having been born 10 years after the passage of the VRA, having never gone to a segregated school (I started school in Indiana, hardly a Southern state), in 2004, I was voting in my 6th election. You could in fact, have been born 21 years after the VRA and be voting for the first time to give control of the Georgia House to the Republicans. The CRA and VRA had very little to do with realignment in Georgia.
I still have a copy of Black and Black’s “The Vital South” and Aistrip’s “Southern Strategy Revisited” sitting on a shelf 5 feet from me here in my home office.
They are both 12-13 years old now, but the foundation of the history is still there.
You can use the whole “racist southerns” line in other states, but you can’t in Georgia.
Yes, I studied my political science and, in fact, have a BA in it.
I also got an A- on my paper for Bullock discussing the very issues I mentioned above on why Georgia is different than they other Southern states. I even interviewed James Carville for that paper (along with Linder, Newt, Max Cleland and a few others).
Maybe you should have gone further than the quickie overview of Poly Sci 101.
In all seriousness, we should really be looking at consolidating counties to save money… 159, are you serious? There isn’t even an incorporated city in Echols county. How’s that possible?
It’s a hold over for the old county unit system when counties, not popoulation determined your legislative representation and votes for statewide office. Like Talmadge used to say, you could win an election in Georgia without carrying a single county with a traffic light.
More meddlers from the “top down”
They’re everywhere apparently.
Progressive Dem
You need to first understand the issue before we can get to solutions. Read this article and it may help you.
No Child Not Left Behind!!
MSN-Kids less likely to graduate than parents
Most states doing little to hold schools accountable, says advocacy group
Your child is less likely to graduate from high school than you were, and most states are doing little to hold schools accountable, according to a study by a children’s advocacy group.
More than half the states have graduation goals that don’t make schools get better, the Education Trust says in a report released Thursday.
And dropout rates haven’t budged: One in four kids is dropping out of high school.
“The U.S. is stagnating while other industrialized countries are surpassing us,” said Anna Habash, author of the report by Education Trust, which advocates on behalf of minority and poor children. “And that is going to have a dramatic impact on our ability to compete,” she said.
In fact, the United States is now the only industrialized country where young people are less likely than their parents to earn a diploma, the report said.
High schools are required to meet graduation targets every year as part of the 2002 federal No Child Left Behind law.
But those targets are set by states, not by the federal government. And most states allow schools to graduate low percentages of students by saying that any progress, or even the status quo in some cases, is acceptable.
For example:
http://controlcongress.com/education/no-child-not-left-behind
Progressive Dem
Solutions!
We need a new direction in high school education, away from the heavy handed, one-size-fits-all No Child Left Behind system that has failed students and strained tax payers.
We need Governor Perdue and Lieutenant Governor Cagle to step up and lead, instead of rubber-stamping failed gimmick programs like Kathy Cox’s Math 123—we need real solutions.
More Choice, Not Less
Why not coordinate the current university, junior college system, certificate programs, and technical colleges with our high schools? Georgia’s only nationally-ranked high school academic program—the math program used in Cherokee, Cobb, and Fulton counties—currently coordinates its advanced math program with local colleges. Why not expand the concept to all high schools, instead of eliminating it, as Kathy Cox has proposed?
How to Expand
Beginning in the 11th grade, public high schools could coordinate curriculums with local universities, junior colleges, certificate programs, and technical colleges to give kids a chance to pursue job training or advanced academics. This would not only save tax-payer money, it would match students with their best opportunities to become productive tax payers after high school. Also, graduates that earn vocational certificates could still expand their education down the road. For example, a nurse’s aide could train to become a nurse.
University-track students would be eligible to have their junior and senior year course work coordinated with a university system, either on campus or via the internet. This would both challenge Georgia students and give them a leg-up when competing with students from other states. This idea has already been proven effective in Cherokee county’s advanced math program—which is nationally ranked.
http://controlcongress.com/uncategorized/sonny-casey-please-help
Shep,
I think you have trouble seeing the forest for the trees.
1. Like many in Georgia, your interst and concern about education is seen through the prism of competitive sports. The Speaker’s meddling into the high school ranking system was immaterial to education.
2. The significant political dividing line between who was right and who was wrong about civil rights is not party affiliation, but rather conservative versus liberal orthodoxy. Conservatives whether they were southern Democrats or western Republicans were opposed to change and opposed every major civil rights bill. Liberals from both parties supported efforts to end discrimination and segregation and supported the enforcement of civil rights guaranteed by the Constitution. History shows that liberals were on the right side of this issue. One of the great ironies is that LBJ, a southern and liberal Democrat hammered through the legislation.
3. I don’t know why some fanatics insist upon showing their ignorance of grammar and basic facts. The official name of the organization is “The Democratic Party”. The phrase “Democratic Party” is considered a proper noun, and the word “Democratic” is used becuase it is a modifier describing the noun “Party”. At the latest GOP convention, the Republican Party voted down a proposal to use the phrase “Democrat Party”. Hailey Barbour said, “We probably should use what the actual name is.” Well no sh*t. Otherwise the party might sound childish and ignorant. I guess some had the good sense not to incorporate name-calling into the party platform.
4. If the Democratic Party of Georgia did such a terrible job of managing this state, why did millions of people move to Georgia? The place had something going for it, and it was probably the strong economy with growth and lots of opportunity.
You can’t have it both ways Progressive Dem. The Dems in this state were, by and large, conservative and governed with a conservative business philosophy. That meant that we provided lower taxes, less unionization, and a cheaper workforce (partically because of lack of unions). Add the mild climate and you had the boom that brought business leaders out of the Northeast and Midwest to the South.
I will throw that assertion right back at you since we’ve seen nearly a half million new Georgia residents move here since the GOP took over as well.
The speaker’s meddling affected competitive sports, but it was the debate team his daughter coached that was the reason for it. As a founder of Chattahoochee High School’s nationally recognized debate team, that was what caught my attention. Also, it was the reasons it was done, one powerful legislator benefitting his own family at the expense of the rest of Georgia.
I would have to say that the issue in 1964 was not liberal versus conservative, but regional. To claim that the 138 out of 172 Republican House members and 27 out of 33 Republican Senators who voted to pass the 1964 Civil Rights Act were somehow in the “liberal” wing of the GOP is at its best revisionist. Never mind it was Eisenhower, a conservative Republican, who sent troops to enforce integration of Little Rock’s Central high School.
Dirksen, who lead the GOP effort in the Senate to get the bill passed, was part of the conservative wing of the GOP.
Republicans have the record, Democrats have the rhetoric. That’s the truth and I challenge you to prove otherwise. And I’ll warn you before hand, trying to say like most Democrats do that because Strom Thurmond switched Parties makes the GOP racist, you’ve already lost. I can negate that easily by saying because Robert Byrd stayed with the Democratic Party makes you all racist.
You can’t have it both ways Shep. Apparently the “150 years of Democrat (sic) stupidty” (sic) wasn’t so bad now was it? The boom in Atlanta occurred largely as a result of Democrats in Atlanta. William Hartsfield was the force behind the construction of Lake Lanier, which provided a water supply for the explosive growth in metro Atlanta. Ivan Allen brought professional sports to the south and helped usher in peaceful integration. In so doing he convinced the rest of the nation that Atlanta was a safe place to invest with progressive thinking. Maynard Jackson expanded Hartsfield Airport into the busiest in the world. Busbee and Tom Murphy led the construction of the World Congress Center. Andy Young set the stage for the 1996 Summer Olympics. And Sam Massel launched the construction of the MARTA rail system, which made the Olympics possible. The economic trend for growth – population and economic – was established under Democratic leadership. Even crazy Zell Miller back when he was a liberal Democrat eliminated the sales tax on food, and through the creation of the Georgia Lottery vastly improved the quality of Georgia colleges. The explosive growth in the Port of Savannah since 2000 came as result of investments by a string of Democrats. Whatever population growth has occurred since Sonny came into office is a result of past trends and it is laughable to believe that the Go Fish Governor is the reason why people flock to Georgia. Once again the history of Democratic leadership was pretty spectacular and distinguished from competitive cities. Atlanta emerge dinto an international city.
Congrats on founding the Chatahoochee debate team. I’m sure your family is proud of your accomplishment, but it doesn’t have any bearing on the quality of education in this state, nor my original point about the current governor ignoring the education problem. You also continue to ignore the original point about the governor and the GOP leadership doing nothing about transportation and education. You can’t fix the transportation problem by adopting a policy of no increased spending.
Finally with regard to Civil Rights, if you don’t believe that the passage of the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act didn’t cause a major realignment of the parties in the south, you must be on crack. Prior to 1964, John Tower was the only GOP senator from the south. After the passage of the CRA and VRA, the Republican Party became competitive in the south. We can quibble over Dirkson being conservative since he voted with FDR as a Congressman and supported civil rights. Eisenhower on the other hand was far from a conservative. He built the interstate highway system, grew the new deal programs, made HEW into a cabinet level position, appointed Earl Warren and worried about the military industrial complex. That sir is not a conservative record.
Nationally, conservatives have a record that has been wrong about Civil Rights, Viet Nam, the environment, women’s rights, Medicare, health care, worker safety, global warming, Iraq and most recently deregulation. In Georgia the current conservative and also Republican leaders are failing to address education and transportation.
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