Despite months of unrest and national embarrassment at the University of Missouri-Columbia, it seems the folks in the Missouri Senate don't just agree with how the campus is being managed—they want to pay for even more of it. Simply baffling.
A budget bill restoring most of the Missouri House cuts to the University of Missouri and giving all higher education a 6 percent boost in funding passed the Missouri Senate on a 24-8 vote Thursday.
The UM System would receive $26.8 million in new funding under the bill, its share of a performance funding increase of $55.8 million for all colleges and universities. The bill also cuts $1 million from the allocation to UM System administration, down from the $7.6 million cut approved in the House.
First, enrollment at Mizzou itself is down. Why in the world would the Senate spend more money on fewer students, especially when the school is literally closing down dorms? Second, if a university isn't delivering the value it should for the taxpayer money being given to it, that university isn't owed another copper penny. State universities owe their funders a quality education that can be touted without embarrassment. I could even understand freezing Mizzou's budget allocation at current levels while increasing the budgets of other state schools.
But to increase state spending at Mizzou? That's a terrible message to send: one that not only condones the University's behavior, but rewards it.
Mizzou imploded last year thanks to a remarkable failure in leadership on the part of the Columbia campus. Unfortunately, it appears that failure of leadership is still rippling through state government.
