Yahoo News, Dominion Post – The $45 million shortfall West Virginia University faces is still some of the biggest news around town. In the past week, we’ve discussed the issue in terms of what the university could have done and should do (or not do) in the future. But there are multiple factors at play, which is why, today, we’re looking at how the West Virginia Legislature contributed to the crisis.
Read the full editorial.
According to the think tank West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy, “if West Virginia lawmakers had simply kept higher education funding at the same levels as a decade ago, West Virginia University would have an estimated additional $37.6 million in state funding for FY 2024 ….”
We’re not going to try to replicate their math. But we can easily see from available data that West Virginia has been short-changing higher education as a whole over the last couple decades. Not only has the Legislature decreased its funding support for public institutions of higher education, but what it does give is significantly lower than the national average.
