Wyoming's Joint Education Committee is considering opening up the state's Hathaway Scholarship to students attending religious or other private in-state colleges.
That's one of several changes the committee considered and tabled during a meeting in Casper on Thursday. Other bills, now being drafted, would increase the scholarship award, alter the payment schedule or eliminate certain academic requirements.
A state endowment funds the Hathaway Scholarship and it's available to any student who graduates from a Wyoming public high school while meeting a certain degree of academic performance. Currently, it can be used at the University of Wyoming or in-state public community colleges.
One draft bill would expand the program, allowing students to use their Hathaway award for tuition at religious or other private schools.
Wyoming's new school voucher program does something similar for K-12 schools, but that program is being challenged in court and a judge has paused payments while the case plays out.
Rep. Tom Kelly (R-Sheridan) said he supports opening the Hathaway to private colleges, but said lawmakers should proceed cautiously.
"We're operating under a judicial fog right now," he said. "While I love this idea and I would support it, I think we’re kind of spinning our wheels or chasing our tails right now until we understand exactly what the final decision is going to be on the constitutionality of such programs."
Senate Minority Whip Chris Rothfuss (D-Laramie), the committee's lone Democrat, said he would oppose the bill because it would ultimately take money away from public institutions.
"Any dollars that end up being captured by an expansion of availability to the private sector is going to take away from what can be given out [to UW or community college students]," he said. "It would be tax revenue going to pay for the operations of a non-state facility that otherwise would have gone to the operations of a state facility."
The draft bill itself is in rough shape. The Legislative Service Office produced a draft with extensive notes, saying they needed policy direction from the committee before they could produce something more solid.
Lawmakers have to decide, for example, how to reshape the Hathaway Scholarship award, which is paid out in semesters, for schools that do not operate on that schedule, such as Laramie's WyoTech, which runs a nine-month program.
The committee decided a working group would hammer out these details and provide direction to legislative staff. The issue will return, in a draft bill with more clarity, at the committee's next meeting in November.
Another draft bill the Joint Education Committee is discussing would pay out the Hathaway award in a lump sum, rather than being doled out over four years. Rothfuss said this would benefit students seeking two-year or technical degrees.
"We want to meet people where they're at and give them the higher educational opportunities that they want within our public education system in the state," he said. "It is to help to provide maximum flexibility."
The committee will also vote on this draft bill in November, alongside yet another proposal to increase the dollar amount of each level of award.
Lawmakers are interested in increasing the payouts because the current amounts identified in state statute are worth less than ever. A Legislative Services Office memo shared with the committee detailed how the rising cost of university and college tuition has led to an erosion of the Hathaway's value across the last two decades.
The memo shows that while the top level Hathaway paid for 91% of a UW student’s estimated tuition and fees for the 2006-2007 school year, it now covers just 41%.
Similar declines impact the usefulness of all Hathaway payouts, at all levels of award and across all of Wyoming's public higher ed institutions.
When the education committee reconvenes in November, it will consider at least four separate draft bills affecting the Hathaway: one opening the program up for private institutions, one enabling the lump sum payment method, one increasing the award amounts, and one eliminating or altering the ACT requirement that currently helps determine which level of the award a student receives.
