Regents get first look at new budget

Friday, June 4, 2004 | 11:29 a.m.

ELKO -- Regents want Nevada's higher education priorities placed on getting more students to graduate from colleges and universities and on training more nurses and doctors.

The board of regents of the University and Community College System of Nevada got its first look Thursday at a proposed 2005-2007 budget of $1.47 billion, an 11.4 percent over the present two-year spending program.

The tentative budget could go higher when such things as inflation and the cost of operating new buildings are added in. Regents will get a look at a final budget in August, Buster Neel, vice chancellor for finance and administration, said.

The budget estimates the present enrollment, the equivalent of 61,108 full- time students, will grow by 6 percent in the coming two fiscal years.

Regent Jill Derby said Nevada stood at the bottom in the nation in graduation rates and she wondered if $4.75 million over the next biennium to improve that was enough.

Neel said it would be a start.

The budget said both institutions' graduation rates fall slightly below the average among Western states of 50.2 percent. It said as of 2002 only Great Basin College has recorded a graduation rate above the 2000 western average for public two-year institutions, with a rate of 27 percent.

The $4.75 million would be used for hiring more counselors and advisers.

UNLV President Carol Harter said that would help. "The school advisory structure is the key to retention." She said in some cases, there is one adviser to 300 to 1,000 students.

The tentative budget calls for expanding enrollment at the School of Medicine over the next four years by 40 students, from its present 208. The cost for the next biennium will be $4.3 million. It's aimed at meeting the shortage of doctors in Nevada.

The request calls for doubling the number of nurses in training to ease the critical shortage in Nevada. That would close to about $7 million. The student-teacher ratio would be lowered to 8-1. At the Community College of Southern Nevada, it is now 14-1.

Among the other enhancements called for in the budget was an expansion of medical residency and fellowship training program in Las Vegas and Reno, at a cost of $3.83 million over the biennium.

The budget would establish the Lou Ruvo Center for Alzheimer's Disease and Brain Aging on land donated by Las Vegas. The cost would be $823,380 in 2007.

The system seeks $372,000 to support rural emergency medical services at the Great Basin College in Elko. This would upgrade training of emergency medical personnel for the scores of volunteers in the sparsely populated counties.

The document asks for $26 million to provide performance-based salary increases for professional and classified employees. It is calculated to give annual merit increases of about 2.5 percent.

The system also wants $9.7 million to upgrade the pay of part-time faculty. The target is $862 per credit at the universities, $819 per credit at the Nevada State College in Henderson and $776 for part-time instructors at the community colleges.

There is a one-time request for $7 million for equipment for the dental school at UNLV.

Regent Tom Kirkpatrick said he "shudders" every time he sees more money being requested from the state for the dental program.

But Harter said UNLV originally asked for $12 million in equipment and received only $3 million so far. She said the students pay the highest tuition among dental schools

"We never said we would do a dental program for free," Harter said.