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Commission on Higher Education seeks recurring operational funding, Pascal increase and residency-rule simplification
Summary
Commission on Higher Education Director Dr. Jeff Perez briefed the subcommittee on CHE’s strategic plan, the agency’s role in program review and licensing, plans to simplify residency regulations, and recurring requests including salary adjustments, DTO fee coverage and increased Pascal funding.
Dr. Jeff Perez, speaking for the Commission on Higher Education (CHE), summarized the agency’s broad responsibilities, new strategic plan and several recurring budget requests before the House Ways and Means subcommittee.
Perez introduced his senior team and said CHE administers scholarships, conducts program productivity reviews, licenses institutions and provides numerous statutorily required reports. He said the commission recently approved a vision and values statement and is now pursuing clearer, more coherent residency regulations in response to longstanding confusion about who qualifies for in‑state status.
Perez described CHE’s program‑review work and said the agency is tightening processes to identify chronically underperforming programs. Under current policy CHE flags ‘‘noncompliant’’ programs based on enrollment and completion thresholds assessed across cohort windows (Perez referenced cohorts such as 2016–20 and said the agency aims to complete remaining cohort reporting by April). He noted CHE can recommend termination for chronically deficient programs but does not itself terminate programs.
On budget priorities, Perez outlined recurring requests to support salary enhancements for staff, coverage for a substantial DTO IT fee increase (he cited a roughly $160,000 ask to break even on DTO rate changes), and vendor support to manage an educational enhancement program. He also suggested raising Pascal recurring funding from $1,500,000 to $2,000,000 to sustain statewide shared library resources and asked that some HEAP/S3CI carry‑forward balances be distributed across campuses as part of housekeeping and program management.
Perez also proposed expanding the College Transition Program (CTP) — which serves students with intellectual disabilities — into independent institutions and creating a fund of up to $90,000 to support schools that want to develop such programs.
Committee members sought clarification on CHE’s compliance metrics and asked for the most recent cohort results; Perez said CHE is finalizing the 2016–20 cohort and will share the data with the committee, and he reiterated the commission’s intention to improve the rigor of its program‑accountability work.
The subcommittee did not vote on appropriations; members asked for follow‑up documents and data that CHE said it would provide.
