A whole lot of things about Arizona’s Republican Governor, Jan Brewer, don’t make much sense. As Jezabel’s Irin Carmon wrote back in September “Brewer is reminding us of Sarah Palin inasmuch as she makes all women in politics look bad and makes their defenders queasy. She’s also reactionary — and has a way with words.”
She also has a way with policy. At least as far as higher education goes, she just doesn’t make any sense. According to an article in the Yuma Sun:
In a message to legislators last week, Brewer said her goal is to double the number of bachelor degrees awarded by 2020. She indicated she prefers state-alone campuses for the new four-year colleges rather than the current two-plus-two programs jointly operated by community colleges and the universities in some communities, including ours.
The system Gov. Brewer is proposing is like the three-tier system operated in California, which has community colleges, four-year colleges and universities. The goal is to allow students to choose the level of education they need at the cost they can afford.
Well that doesn’t sound too bad, if the state’s prepared to spend a whole lot of money.
Brewer, however, doesn’t want to spend money. In fact just last week Brewer said she planned to save Arizona money by cutting university funding 20 percent and reducing state support for community college by 47 percent.
Reacting to Brewer’s proposal, the Arizona regents planned to “look for every possible cost savings and efficiency that we can find.” It’s odd then, that the latest 3-tier higher education plan pitched by Brewer is, if good for Arizona, definitely inefficient.
