Study says Nebraska should Implement Performance-Based Funding

By: Stephanie Morrissey - Email

Updated: Wed 6:20 PM, Mar 13, 2013

A new study has prompted the idea of performance-based funding for Nebraska colleges. That means schools would have monetary incentives to meet certain goals.

Right now, funding is usually linked to enrollment; the more students a school has, the more money they get. The study, done by the Platte Institute, suggests performance-based funding would hold schools more accountable.

A summary of the Platte Institute's paper is below:

The study delineates how emphasis in public policymaking in relation to higher education has historically been, and still is in Nebraska, on creating capacity in the state with the specifics of the nature and use of that capacity being left to the education “experts” inside the institutions. Over the past decade, the policy emphasis has shifted considerably in many states – away from capacity building to capacity utilization, to ensuring that the higher education enterprise is responsive to the high priority needs of the state. This is made possible in many states (Nebraska among them) because the population of young people is not growing. Funding increases can’t be justified on the basis of enrollment increases.

The states that have embraced this “capacity-utilization” perspective on public policymaking have 1) established clear goals regarding the desired future conditions of the state and its citizens, 2)aligned policies, particularly resource allocation policies, with these goals, 3)created accountability mechanisms that emphasize institutional and system performance rather than the manner in which resources were allocated or expended.