Dive Brief:
- Indiana public colleges would have to cut programs deemed to produce "low earning" graduates under a bill passed by the state General Assembly on Friday.
- The legislation did not establish its own definition for a low earning program, instead deferring to language in the major spending and tax bill passed by Republicans this past summer. Under that law, an undergraduate degree is considered to have low earnings outcomes if, four years after graduating, students' median earnings do not outpace the median wages of certain workers who hold only a high school degree.
- The bill, which now heads to Gov. Mike Braun's desk, would take effect July 1 if signed. The Republican governor has not commented publicly on the measure. But in the past, he has supported legislation that cuts low-enrollment programs and prioritizes trade and technical training over traditional four-year college degrees.
Dive Insight:
The change — to be made with a couple dozen words added to Indiana code — would put Indiana state colleges on further notice regarding their degree outcomes.
Under the federal standard, a graduate degree is considered a "low earning" program if the median earnings of its students four years after graduation aren't higher than the median earnings of workers with a bachelor's degree in the same state.
If they wanted to continue offering an affected program, college officials would have to seek a waiver from the Indiana Higher Education Commission. All 14 members of the commission are appointed by the governor.
An analysis of federal data by Chalkbeat Indiana found that the bill would likely impact a handful of degrees at Indiana University, Ball State University, the University of Southern Indiana and Ivy Tech Community College.
But students and faculty in the state have raised concerns about the potential reach of the legislation since before it passed the General Assembly.
An anthropology student at the University of Indiana Bloomington told the institution's student newspaper that the bill could pave the way for lawmakers to eliminate his entire department. A lecturer with the university's Parks, Recreation, and the Outdoors program also noted that state pay for seasonal workers at the Indiana Department of Natural Resources is “notoriously bad," setting up his program to qualify as low earning.
Indiana's public colleges have already moved to cut or merge over 400 degrees in response to a law targeting programs with low enrollment that Braun signed last year.
The provision to eliminate low earning degrees passed as part of a larger bill touching on multiple elements of higher education, including accreditation. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle said they had not realized the clause was included until late in the voting process, the Indianapolis Star reported.
"I didn’t realize this language was in this bill until this morning," Republican state Sen. Jean Leising said Feb. 27 on the Senate floor.
Much of the attention previously paid to the bill centered on a provision that would have barred Indiana teenagers from having social media accounts without written consent from a parent or guardian. That proposal, included when the bill was first introduced, was stripped from the legislation prior to its passage.
