The Hawkeye

On February 12, the Governor's office announced Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal's plan to spare the state's higher learning institutions another round of cuts for the next fiscal year beginning July 1. The decision comes after $250 million in crippling cuts to higher education in the past year and what was expected to be another $146 million before the governor's decision was announced.

Thus far, the negative effects of the financial cuts on students have come in the form of program eliminations, Flight Path changes in spite of course catalogue promises and fewer offerings of required courses which have led to students rushing to register for larger classes.

A recent decision from the ULS Board of Regents has required ULM to axe its master's programs in psychology and music.

"The Board of Regents is looking at what they call low completer programs-programs that do not graduate a specified number of graduates each year over a three-year average," said Dr. Derle Long, the department head of the Division of Music. "So they looked at our master's program over the last several years. We're doing what we need to do now. We're on track to graduate the requisite number, but as of five years we were not and so are still labeled as a low completer.

"It affects the entire musical culture of Monroe because these grads sing in the productions on campus and at Strauss Theatre, in churches on Sunday and other days music is required. Some of them play with the Monroe Symphony orchestra," Long said. "So if we don't have some of those students around, all of those groups will be diminished."

Long said he and his colleagues are currently preparing an appeal with the hope that the Board of Regents will reconsider its decision.

Psychology professor Dr. William McCown believes that ULM will continue to have a strong graduate program.

"People specifically interested in school psychology may have to go elsewhere" he said. "Very often, people who move out of our region to obtain more education find higher paying jobs elsewhere. That is sad.  We need to hold on to our local talent, nurture it and realize that it is something special."

In some cases, where the courses on a student's Flight Path are no longer available, classes that are related in content are being offered to plug up the holes. This alternative has raised questions by some as to why the classes they must now take differ from the content of the course catalog when they decided to major in a specific field. In the past, students have been assured that the course requirements for graduation would not deviate from the catalog specifications published in the year a student chooses a major.

"I was supposed to take all of the speech pathology classes. Now that they've cut the budget, half of the classes are gone," said Yee Man Lo, a 22 year-old speech pathology major from Hong Kong. "So now instead of taking speech pathology, I have to take health studies classes. It is very frustrating. I wanted to learn more about my major."

Lo said she worked very hard starting out in order to have a lighter work load her senior year, but the budget cuts have not only changed the courses she must take, but have increased the hours she needs to graduate, meaning more money and effort on her part than originally planned.

"For my senior year, I had planned to take two semesters of 12 and 13 hours, but now I have to take 15 and 15," Lo said. "I don't understand how that works out. The speech pathology classes they cut, they've tried to substitute with health sciences. No one has been able to tell me why this has happened to me."

SGA President Hanna Livingston says that the SGA has plans to send a resolution to the state legislature and to the governor's office.

"We hope to start a chain reaction through all of the universities to send the message loud and clear that we, as students, are offended and upset over the horrifying budget cuts taking place in our state," Livingston said. "We want them to understand the more money they cut from higher education, the more students will continue to leave Louisiana for education and jobs."

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