March 22, 2004

Boise State President Calls For Schools To Unite To Help Sell Higher Education

Too many Idahoans do not appreciate the value of higher education, and it is up to the state’s four public four-year colleges and their alumni to join together and counter those views, said the president of Boise State University last week. Bob Kustra, who took over as BSU president last July, announced plans for his school’s alumni association and its counterparts at the University of Idaho, Idaho State University and Lewis-Clark State College to combine forces in an effort to convince the state’s lawmakers and citizens that “higher education is an investment, not a cost.” Kustra made his comments in Boise last Wednesday while addressing a quarterly business leaders’ breakfast sponsored by radio station KBOI. Kustra said he planned to bring the alumni association presidents of the four state higher education institutions together this spring for strategy sessions to discuss how they can present a united front when advocating for additional funding to meet their schools’ financial challenges. “What we can do is build support back in these legislative districts for a [better] higher education budget,” he said. That way, when the Legislature arrives in Boise for the 2005 session, the interests of higher education will have a stronger, clearer and more united message, he added. “We have to start way [before] the beginning of [the next] legislative session. We have to help those running for [public office and ensure] that they understand from the beginning — when they start formulating their positions and their candidacies — where higher education stands in the overall scheme of things. “Our plan is to get our alumni associations together and project our message that higher education is an investment,” Kustra continued, “and we’re going to prove it. It is my responsibility to demonstrate [to the public] what a difference we make in this community and in this state.” The alumni associations of BSU, UI, ISU and LCSC must “work together, especially now under the pressure of reduced funding on behalf of Idaho public higher education,” said Kustra. “That is the only way were going to get faculty salaries up [so] we can compete [for high-quality instructors] with the best [schools] in the nation.” Kustra, a former Illinois state legislator who also served two terms as that state’s lieutenant governor, said Idaho’s public universities and their alumni must become more collaborative and enterprising if higher education is to receive its fair allocation of state funding. “Too many Idahoans do not appreciate the fact that higher education is an investment,” Kustra said, “and I don’t think enough of their [elected] leaders have projected themselves to talk about higher education as an investment. “So when [state lawmakers] get together, they talk about cutting, constraining, reducing, eliminating — whatever it is — higher education costs. Well, I would suggest we turn it around and [sell higher education] as an investment.” The Boise State president, who formerly served as president at Eastern Kentucky University, said that for too long, Idaho’s higher education leaders were not assertive enough in advocating for their schools’ financial needs. “For too many years, higher education just waited until the legislative session started, and then they very meekly went up to the capitol [with their requests to the finance committee],” he said. “Well, by then the whole deal had [already] been put together.” By combining the forces of BSU, UI, ISU and LCSC, Kustra hopes a single voice among Idaho’s higher education institutions will pay dividends for all of them. “And, in the long run,” he said, “for all of our citizens.” Media contact Bob Evancho University Relations 426-1643 or 375-7662