Most high school students taking AP or DE in high school are not planning them in the context of fulfilling pre-major or degree requirements at college (and they do not know what college they will be going to). So having lots of AP or DE credit going into college can be a detriment to a student under this provision, especially if many of them are only accepted for “general elective” credit rather than specific course credit for pre-major or degree requirements.
This type of thing makes it more difficult for a student to plan the finances for college, since it adds another way for net price to fluctuate outside of the student’s ability to plan and control.
It’s devastating, and will certainly prompt students to look for offers elsewhere. And those who can’t will wind up either pursuing degrees they don’t want or, more likely, just increasing their student debt load.
Or increase capacity in those departments if there is a capacity-limitation issue in those majors.
However, if the motivation for the bill is to reduce state spending on university education in “unnecessary” majors, then increasing funding to increase capacity in “necessary” majors would not be the goal of the bill.
Considering AP/DE (which in Florida is used to increase rigor of HS curriculum) to further decrease the awards will push high-achieving away from UF/FSU/UCF Burnett. It’s also unfair and stupid to punish students who challenge themselves… and show how little the rep who discusses the proposal knows: AP Calculus, AP Physics1/C are essential preparation for STEM majors, but students would see their scholarships docked if they took these classes.
@rickle1 : in the CC world, the requirements are modest but in the Florida education world, they are already very selective since more than 75% high school students don’t qualify.
Since this is the State Grant, the process can either be need-based (ie., the less your family makes, the more you get) or merit-based (current system, which rewards the roughly top 25% students regardless of need, although fewer than 20% actually take the award.)
Right now only 18% Floridian students receive state grants, which should be considered “low”, not “high”.
Universities can add what they wish in terms of merit but rarely in terms of need, so that moving to a state-wide need-based grant + funding per university for the type of merit they each want to attract might be fairer and more efficient. Obviously not the direction they’re going.
I guess it all depends on how informed and how in good faith the representative is. He could just be a “submarine”, a less powerful member of the assembly tasked by a more powerful one with advancing a ludicrous idea, so that a less ludicrous but rather extreme proposal is passed. But, this is Florida and it’s 2021, so, it could just be the representative doesn’t know what he’s saying.
I personally think it is a power grab. (Control the $ money in appropriations and control what they study) It gets around getting to control what they study by an electoral process.
Thanks. Can you share resources that indicate Diaz as the instigator? Not doubting it but all I can find is Baxley’s name. Baxley is the official author and sure seems to be referring to all his own experiences when talking about it.
'In an interview with the Tampa Bay Times, Baxley said his own background inspired the bill.
While he said his bachelor’s degree in sociology, with a minor in psychology, has been helpful through his career in better understanding people, he said it could only get him “two bucks and a cup of coffee in most towns.”
It was a second associate degree that gave him the credentials to launch his career in funeral services, he said.’
There are probably plenty of people who believe in good faith that education other than for job skills is not desirable or helpful in society, or is a luxury good for the upper middle class. Obviously, such viewpoints are underrepresented on these forums, but that does not mean that they do not exist. Someone who holds such a viewpoint may not want tax money paid by all taxpayers (including those who do not go to college) to subsidize what they see as a luxury good for the upper middle class.
According to the above excerpt+ his bio, the representative has a degree in sociology with a minor in psychology; blames his not doing any internship and not working with the career center to plan for a career + not looking for any sort of further education (social work, law school, teaching, or anything else you can do with such a degree)… on the subjects themselves, which he would probably qualify as “luxury goods”. Except the subjects aren’t really to blame (think of what advice we’d give a rising senior who’s only taken classes for his major); further, back in 72-74, public education was almost free in CC and very low cost at FSU (FSU tuition, for the year, was raised to $570 in 1974, which is about $2,700 in today’s dollars. Even in 2004, tuition was only $3,000 in today’s dollars.)
Right. It sounds to me as if he didn’t have any particular direction or plan in college in terms of how he wanted to use his degree after he graduated. That’s not the fault of the degree or the university.
On further research, It appears to me that this is strictly Baxley’s Bill. Diaz is yea on Education SB 48 on March 4th which was passed 11 to 8 in Committee. It almost gives me hope!
Interesting that, in the analysis, they note that there were only 202 Benacquisto scholars out of 1377 total in 2019-2020. That’s a pretty small amount.
i think it’s possible that benacquisto will still be full coa for oos students, for class of 25 at least. the governor is expanding funding for benacquisto, and the new bill says that funding will be determined by the general appropriations act, so there should be sufficient funding for all benacquisto scholars to get coa.