The Tennessee Promise

An interesting promise was made the other day during the 2014 State of the State address in Tennessee. Governor Bill Haslam announced his Tennessee Promise; below are two excerpts:

“We will promise that he or she can attend two years of community college or a college of applied technology absolutely free.”

“Tennessee will be the only state in the country to offer our high school graduates two years of community college with no tuition or fees along with the support of dedicated mentors.

This promise is bold. I am not a political person so I am going on generalities and stereotypes, but for a republican governor to promise two years of free community college education to the youth of his state is amazing and optimistic.

I will refrain from commenting as others did at The Chronicle, and Inside Higher Ed, but there are a lot of things that are promised in State of the States and during the State of the Union; a promise is merely future state optimism.

With that said, I understand why governor Haslam wants to have a more educated workforce. Tennessee, for the most part, lags the US and the states in the Southern Regional Education Board (SREB) when it comes to higher education attainment. According to the Higher Education Profile & Trends for 2012 published by the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, Tennessee lags in the following two categories: educational attainment for associate’s, bachelor’s, and graduate degrees; and per capita personal income. These are two big important categories and it is easy to understand why Governor Haslam, coming out of the Great Recession, would want to close these gaps and work to try to exceed the national averages.

Also in the Higher Education Profile & Trends, Tennessee exceeds the national standard and the SREB when it comes to public high school graduation rate. Along with the high school graduate rate, the vast majority of Tennessee high school graduates that go to college go to a school in Tennessee. Of undergraduate enrollment for students under-25, most go to a public 2-year (by a substantial margin), followed by public 4-year, for-profit, and then non-profit.

Finally there is an excellent comparison of funding. During the 1999-2000 academic year, 68.2% of public 2-year funding came from state appropriations while in 2011-2012 that figure was 39.9%. During the 1999-2000 academic year, 58.2% of public 4-year funding came from state appropriations while in 2011-2012 that figure was 32.1%.

In addition to the stats provided by the Higher Education Profile & Trends, the governor’s office published a fact sheet about the Tennessee Promise. Eligible institutions are Tennessee’s 27 colleges of applied technology, the 13 community colleges, and in-state independent or four-year public university offering an associate’s degree (no for-profit or out of state extension campuses).

Student eligibility requirements for the Tennessee Promise include (I did not include all of them):

- Student needs to apply senior year of high school;

- Student must start college directly after high school graduation (mostly);

- 12 credit hours per semester;

- Stay in school every semester;

- GPA of 2.0;

- 8 hours of community service.

If any of these eligibility requirements are not met, eligibility is lost.

This means that if you have a highly motivated student who goes to a community college or a place Like Tennessee State right after high school and takes 15 credit hours for four semesters and meet all the requirements to get an associates, the Tennessee Promise will pay for their schooling.

If you have a lightly motivated student who goes to community college right after high school and fails or drops a class (assuming they drop under 12 credits), does not attend every semester, drops below a GPA of 2.0, or forgets about the community service requirement then eligibility is lost.

These requirements are good because it means the state does not have to foot the bill for students who are not going to succeed and will only cover those who are ready and willing for college. Does this leave out a lot of students? Yes. It leaves out those lightly motivated students who might take four to six years to complete an associate's and it leaves out adult students who are already in college or others who want to go back to college.

With all of this said, I know a lot of commentators are skeptical, it is easy to be skeptical, but the reality is that not every student is going to go to public 4-year institution and be illuminated through a liberal art education. Not every student is going to become a philosopher, a scientist or a mathematician. Not every student is going to be a business phenom and launch the next great thing at age 22 and not every student is going to have a transformational experience in college.

Personally, some of the best teaching I have ever seen in all my years of higher education has been at community colleges; you do not always get the best educational experience when a research professor teaches lower division college level writing (for example). Some students just want to go to college and get a degree that will get them a job. The Tennessee Promise is a way for the state of Tennessee to invest in highly motivated students and help them graduate with no debt (mostly no debt), be successful, and have a their associate’s by age 20.