Gov. Jay Nixon on Wednesday visited Missouri State University to sign a bill providing $71.3 million in additional funding - including scholarships and institutional operating funds - to higher education in fiscal 2017.
House Bill 2003 puts into effect a freeze in tuition for undergraduates at higher education institutions, marking the fourth time in seven years Nixon has taken that action.
In March, the MSU Board of Governors approved a resolution to increase undergraduate resident tuition for the 2016-17 academic year by $1 to $206 per credit hour. Student service fees also were scheduled to rise by $8 per semester in the fall.
MSU President Clif Smart said with the signing of HB 2003, those increases would not be levied next school year.
“The result of that means more will stay in school and more of them will attend college,” he said at the bill-signing ceremony at Plaster Student Union. “This was accomplished at a time when many of the states around us are cutting funding for higher education or can’t even pass a budget for higher education, as is true in the state of Illinois.”
The budget also includes a $2 million increase for MSU and the Missouri University of Science and Technology to expand their cooperative engineering program to 200 from 50.
Smart thanked Nixon, a Democrat, for “making higher education funding the No. 1 priority in his budget” and working with Republican Sens. Bob Dixon, of Springfield, Jay Wasson, of Nixa, Mike Parson, of Bolivar, Mike Cunningham, of Rogersville, David Sater, of Cassville, Ron Richard, of Joplin, and Kurt Schaefer, of Columbia.
“Education from pre-kindergarten all the way through graduate school is the best economic development tool there is,” Nixon said before signing the funding bill. “The competition for the jobs of the future is global and will be won by the states and nations with the most skilled, most creative, best educated citizens.”
Last week, legislators passed Nixon a $27 billion fiscal 2017 budget. The governor has until May 6 to approve it.
