College system to give itself new report cards

Friday, Jan. 24, 2003 | 9:46 a.m.

CARSON CITY -- The University and Community College System of Nevada will be getting its first report card in the spring, and it should help the public and state officials decide whether the system is performing up to standards.

Chancellor Jane Nichols announced the new rating system during a meeting of the Senate Finance Committee and the Assembly Ways and Means Committee. The committees were reviewing Gov. Kenny Guinn's proposed $890.7 million two-year budget for the system. Last biennium the system received $717.4 million.

Health care advocates are giving Guinn's higher education budget low marks, however, because it does not include the $12.1 million that the system requested to double the nursing-student enrollment.

According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Nevada is the state with the lowest ratio of nurses per 100,000 people, 520. The highest ratio is in Massachusetts, where they have 1,194 nurses for every 100,000 residents.

For years Nevada also has been near the bottom in the number of its high school graduates going on to higher education. Senate Majority Leader Bill Raggio, R-Reno, said the figure has been about 37 percent but other states are as high as 66 percent.

He complained that Nevada still has not seen a percentage increase. More high school graduates in Northern Nevada go on to college than in Southern Nevada, he said.

But he also complained the state was "spending an inordinate amount of money for remedial courses" at the universities and community colleges for high school graduates.

Nichols cited the raising of admission standards to a 2.75 grade point average in 2006 and 3.0 in 2008 as an example of improvement in the system.

As for the system's report card, that should be available in the spring and will measure things such as retention and graduation of minorities, Nichols said.