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The Senate committee on Higher Education met on March 6th to introduce staff, adopt the rules, and consider organizational issues. The committee heard invited testimony on the Dallas County Promise from Dallas ISD and UNT – Dallas. The committee also heard invited testimony from Texas Higher Education Board on the 60×30 initiative.

This report is intended to give you an overview and highlight of the discussions on the various topics the committee took up. It is not a verbatim transcript of the hearing, but is based upon what was audible or understandable to the observer and the desire to get details out as quickly as possible with few errors or omissions.

 

Staff Introductions.

 

Committee adopted the rules.

 

Invited Testimony

Brian Lusk, Dallas County Promise

  • Goal of the organization is to help students transition into higher education.
  • Aims their efforts at high schools with 50% economically disadvantaged students.
  • Help students apply for FAFSA and college.
  • Dallas County ISD launched P-TECH three years ago, which dove tails closely with the Dallas County Promise.
  • P-TECH was started to create post-secondary opportunities for students.
  • Provided data points on P-TECH progress.
  • Retention rates for the collegiate academy are 89%.
  • Dallas County Promise is well poised to meet their goals for the current school year.

Joe May, Dallas County Promise

  • Dallas County Promise has a variety of partners to help students post-high school.
  • Program is not just a scholarship, it is a way of shaping behavior to help students transition from high school to college.
  • Completing FAFSA is essential to getting low income disadvantaged students into college, which is why the organization focuses on the collection of this data.
  • 67% of seniors completed the FAFSA from 31 partner high schools.
  • 31% year after year increase in college enrollment from high-school partners.
  • 82% students returned to program after spring semester.

Bob Mong, President UNT Dallas

  • Partner with the Dallas County Promise
  • Program has awakened higher education interest in parents and students.
  • Have created an app where students can apply to promise, jobs, and internships through their cell phones.
  • Menendez – Your student advisor ratio is 1:250?
  • Menendez – Do you think it would help if we had a similar ratio in our high schools?
    • Peer student advisors are also effective at advising students.
    • Brian Lusk, counselors are a critical part of helping our students in the PTECH program.
  • Powell – Curious as to whether or not the program starts at the elementary level to talk about the promise?
    • Brian Lusk, we have started to work on students at the elementary level.
    • Bob Mong, there is a movement in Dallas County to get universal Pre-K to help students prepare for kindergarten. We are also working to address a teacher shortage. There is a huge organization working on early teaching.
  • Bettencourt – Congratulates the witnesses on their leadership with the program. Is there any legislative barriers to your cause?
    • Joe May, we appreciate the support of the PTECH legislation. By statute, we cannot charge the students for this, so it is a more expensive offering as we move forward.
    • Cost of the meningitis vaccination is also keeping students from going to college because it is so expensive.
  • Watson – Emphasized that having a booster given to kids that are still in the public-school system would allow students to go to higher education without getting the meningitis vaccination, and thus avoid the high costs.
  • West – Mentioned that getting universities to work together on these issues is important in terms of school finance. If the state is not providing the resources for programs like Dallas Promise, they are failing Texas as a whole because the demographics in the school system reflect the demographics in Texas.
  • West – What resources do you need in order to ensure the development of your program?
  • Bettencourt – Pointed out that Houston needs to catch up to the progress that Dallas is having in this area.

Raymund Paredes, Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board

  • Provided an update on 60×30 Texas.
  • Texas is not improving education at a competitive rate compared to other states.
  • State needs to focus on preparing students to go to college.
  • Program is right on track to meet education goals but has no wiggle room.
  • Higher education is getting better, but not fast enough.
  • Challenges related to African American students, Latino students, and economically disadvantaged:
    • Poverty is the biggest deterrent in pursing higher education.
    • Problem getting men to obtain higher education credentials.
  • Menendez – You mentioned poverty as being a barrier, I would like to see the state invest in first generation initiatives. Do you think this might be helpful?
    • There is no doubt first generation students have challenges going to college. Yes, it would make a big difference.
  • Bettencourt – How can we address the gender gap for the economically disadvantage pursuing higher education?
    • Low income males need a lot of mentoring, they need role models.
  • Bettencourt – Emphasized that a 15-point gender gap is substantial.
  • We are sending about 52% of our public-school graduates to college. Massachusetts sends over 70%. California sends 60%.
  • Menendez – Wants to make sure that students are aware of the requirements they should have to maintain scholarships and stay in college.
    • We need to increase academic advising, and make sure students and families are sure about what they need to do.
  • West – I asked you to come up with a strategy in the spring to address these issues. Do you have some of that strategy included in the budget?
    • We have included exceptional items to fund programs that we know work, but not to get to scale.
  • West – Why not?
    • Because that is a decision that is up to you.
  • West – I think you need to provide us those numbers and the costs that are necessary to achieve the higher education goals of Texas. If we do not fund it, we will suffer the consequences, but at least you did your part. As a commissioner of education, you need to give us your requests and tell us about the consequences.
    • We will give you that data before session is over with.
  • West – Are you saying that we need to put a break on developing additional programs?
    • We need to be diligent in the expansion process. We have to consider the recommendation to fund enrollment growth, inflation, and then fund the projects that we think we need.
  • West – Will that model work in the state of Texas?
    • We need to fund enrollment growth. Enrollment growth is the best measure of higher education success, but it has gone down 26 percent.
  • We have to support and invest in open education resources.
  • West – Compare Texas to other states in the development of these resources.
    • We are in the very early stages of developing these resources, we are probably around a national average.
  • West – What is the average cost of textbooks?
    • It depends on the discipline.
  • Menendez – Asked for a desegregated copy of data from the presentation.
  • We need to do a better job in making sure students know what their marketable skills are and infusing marketable skills in curricula.

No further business.

Committee will stand recess subject to call of the chair.