Advice for States on "Funding Degrees"

Advice for States on "Funding Degrees": Question 5. Based on Missouris experience with funding for results, what advice do you have for states that are considering funding degrees?
In looking back at Missouris funding for results program, 1994-2002, what advice can we provide, not only for ourselves in Missouri when we reinstitute performance funding, but for other states that are now attracted to performance funding 2.0?
For funding degrees, one, it is very important that we get agreement on why we are doing performance funding and what the major objectives to performance funding are at the front end of instituting a performance funding program. Two, it is extremely important to bring technical expertise to the table at the front end. Too often, great ideas in policy are put into force and the technical people who have to implement it are then brought to the table and the questions they raise change the dynamic of what that policy could or should have been. So I encourage [involving] the technical people at the very beginning of the process.
Design systems whereby institutions are able to compete against themselves. As opposed to a zero sum, where one institution wins and the other institution loses, set aside funding whereby an institution can achieve and get that funding by improving against its own past performance or maintaining standards above performance relative to its peers in the nation. But set it up in a way that every institution has the opportunity to succeed and receive performance rewards.
Its important to build political support for performance funding at the front end. Its important to build sustainability of performance funding. Performance funding involves agreement to the conceptual framework and also agreement to the model and implementation. Find a way to have a performance funding model that can stay alive in good economic times as well as bad economic times. If we do performance funding and then when money is tight we dont do it, as years pass then we have to rebuild peoples understanding of why performance funding is an important thing to do.

Category:

Education

Tags:

• financial aid
• Missouri
• higher education