Arkansas Academic Challenge Scholarship Advisory Council – August 3, 2009
Posted on August 3rd, 2009
Date & Time: Tuesday, August 3, 2009 at 2:30 PM
Location: Room 171, State Capitol
Agenda: http://tr.im/vkge
Attachments: none
2:33 pm – Introduction of committee members are being made.
2:34 pm – Lt. Gov. Halter is making comments. He started out speaking from the normal testimony chairs in the back of the room rather than going to the podium to make his presentation. Do you think that is the sign of a humble man, or just one beat down by the power structure here in the Capitol.
2:36 pm – Lt. Gov. Halter mentioned that a legislator has been talking about repealing the enabling legislation for the lottery. He is referring, of course, to Senator Sue Madison.
2:37 pm – Before you start feeling too sorry for the Lt. Gov., you should know that he has…. oh I don’t know maybe 12 or 15 professional photographers here taking pictures of him during his comments. (I sometimes exaggerate.)
2:39 pm – Dr. Jim Purcell is currently making a presenation about non-traditional award priorities.
2:41 pm – The goal is for Arkansas to reach the Southern Regional Education Board’s (SREB) average for citizens holding batchelor’s degrees by 2015.
2:43 pm – This will mean that we will need to increase the production of batchelor’s degrees by 64% (7,098 more graduates per year) each of the next six years to reach the SREB average.
2:45 pm – 60% of all AR college graduates reside in only 8 of 75 counties.: Benton, Washington, Sebastian, Garland, Saline, Pulaski, Faulkner, Johnson, and Craighead.
2:47 pm – Arkansas was ranked 51st nationwide in 2000 for Bachelors degrees or higher. In 2002 we were ranked 49th. (Thank God for Mississippi?)
2:48 pm – Arkansas ranked 48th in percentage of population holding an associates degree, with 58% of all associates degree receipients residing in 12 counties.
2:50 pm – There are three non-traditional groups. 1) Students nearing completions called “near-completers,” 2) Students entering college not immediately after high school and stop-outs called “delayed/returners,” and Traditional-age Students who did not qualify for the Academic Challenge scholarship right after high school called “earn-in” starting with class of 2010.
2:53 pm – The majority of scholarship funds are targeted to students directly out of high school. There is $8 million in funds availiable for non-traditional students for the years 2010 to 2011. In future years ADHE will recommend more or less depending on usage of the scholarship and lottery revenue.
2:55 pm – ADHE recommends to have students apply for aid via the univeral scholarship web application. They divide the subgroups allocating 4 million to near completers ($2 million to bachelors and $2 million to community colleges) and $4 million for delayed and returning adults with an allocation of $2 million for each group.
2:58 pm – Rep. Randy Stewart asked if military scholarship and GI Bill funds would be included in scholarship priorities. Dr. Purcell assured him that they would not.
2:59 pm – Sen. Robert Thompson is asking about how the priorization would be done for near completers. The the first category is closeness to completion, next would be if the student is enrolled/admitted in workforce critical-needs degree program (Determined by Workforce Cabinet), financial need (EFC), and finally the GPA.
3:03 pm – For the delayed/returning adults the priority will be giving to those not requiring remediation and the ACT/SAT/Compass or equivalent score, finally the financial need. Those returning it would be the same except previous college GPA instead of standardized test scores, and next is those admitted/enrolled in critical-needs degree programs.
3:10 pm – Again, it appears that the non-legislative board members of this council do not understand or are unaware of what the enabling legislation established as the purpose of the council. I asked if we could have this read aloud. Jodie Mahoney provided the purpose to be briefly read by me.
3:18 pm – The purpose of this committee is to make recommendations in how to best utilize the Academic Challege Scholarship to increase the percentage of Arkansans completing degrees. The emphasis is, by nature, going to be those students that most likely to complete in the shortest amount of time. Students who need to be remediated or are not substantially complete with a degree are obviously going to be a higher risk investment to meet the goal.
3:24 pm – Question was asked of Dr. Purcell, “Is it possible that lottery scholarships will be avaliable for January 2010. He said that would not be possible.
3:26 pm – Rep. Roebuck is asking about the one stop scholarship application process cost and timeline. INA is doing software development for less than $800,000 appropriated out of the existing scholarship fund balance. This contract was awarded without a bid process.
3:29 pm – Senator Thompson informed Dr. Purcell that he has a problem with using critical degrees as a priority for scholarship award. I disagree with Sen. Thompson.
3:31 pm – Rep. Burris is asking if we have statistics on number of Arkansas graduates who move out or or remain in state.
3:33 pm – I just noticed that the composition of this committee is dominated by educators with almost no representation from industry or ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT agencies in the state. I fear this will severely limit the wisdom of the council in determining what is best for the state overall.
3:36 pm – The council members: Dr Jim Purcell, Director or ADHE; Dr. Diana Julian, Interim Commissioner of the Arkansas Department of Education; Dr. Tom Kimbrell, Executive Director of the Arkansas Association of Education Administrators; Mr. Charles Evans, Associate Executive Director of the Arkansas School Boards Association; Mr. Kim Arnell, Assistant Director of the Arkansas Bureau of Legislative Research; Mrs. Tara Smith, Coordinator of Financial Aid for Department of Higher Education; Ms. Elyse Price, Assistant Coordinator of Financial Aid for Arkansas Department of Higher Education; Dr. Steven Murray, Chancellor of Phillips Community College; Dr. Sally Carder, President of National Park Community College; Dr. Robert Potts, Chancellor of Arkansas State University; Dr. Walter Kimbrough, President of Philander Smith College; Mr. John Jefferson, Financial Aid Director, Southern Arkansas University Tech.; Dr. Daniel Pugh, Dean of Students at University of Arkansas.
3:46 pm – Please note: I don’t think Halter really had any photographers here. I was making a joke. Damn! the poor fellow never gets a break. Now I feel bad.
3:49 pm – Discussion about making a foreign langauge a part of the required core curriculum.
3:52 pm – Next meeting is tenatively set at 1:30 pm on Tuesday, August 25, 2009 in Room 171 of the State Capitol.
3:54 pm – Meeting Adjourned.
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