resources for higher education, the
Committee on Government and
Higher Education made three major
recommendations repeated here:
1. 'Regarding higher education, the
work of budget officers should
be confined to: (a) analysis of
the total budget requests; (b)
recommendation to the gover-
nor of the total amount needed
for higher education, along with
the results of the budget anal-
ysis.
2. 'Officers and trustees of the in-
stitutions of higher education
should have the right to defend
their budgets before the gover-
nor and the legislature rather
than to be forced to depend on
a third party to present budget
justification on their behalf.
3. 'Annual allotments or full grants
of appropriated funds are pref-
erable to quarterly or monthly
allotments for higher educa-
-tion.'4
"Freedom from continuing control
by executive agencies is the most im-
portant concept that emerges from
constitutional autonomy for higher
education. It is scarcely necessary to
add that this does not mean that the
state colleges are asking to be com-
pletely removed from the process by
which the State makes and allocates
its resources. The change from the
present system that is being asked is
that the Constitution recognize that
once the Executive's recommendation
has been acted upon by the legislature
and money has been appropriated,
supervision of the expenditure of
4 committee on government and higher
education, the efficiency of freedom
34-35 (1959).
278
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funds be placed in the hands of the
institutions and their governing
board.
"What this means in specific terms
may be seen in the new constitution
recently adopted by the State of
Michigan. There the institutional
boards were given power of 'general
supervision of institutions and the
control and direction of all expendi-
tures from the institutions' funds.'5
"Michigan, like Maryland and al-
most every other State, is engaged in
the huge task of expanding and im-
proving public higher education.
States are confronted with the prob-
lem of a predicted enormous need, the
brunt of which will be felt over a
comparatively short time span. Plan-
ning and coordination are essential,
requiring that authorities responsible
for the various institutions of higher
education be authorized to strike a
balance between the needs of a par-
ticular institution and the require-
ments of the system as a whole. This
is always a complex matter in the
administration of any public trust; in
the case of higher education with its
unique traditions of freedom from
external pressures, it is especially diffi-
cult.
"Coordination has been defined as
'the act of regulating and combining
so as to give harmonious results.
Presumably this definition implies
some degree of integration, central-
ization, and force.'6 Factors behind
the larger need for planning and co-
ordination are the increasing com-
plexity of higher education and the
increasing size of state government.
5 mich. const, art. VIII.
6 L. glenny, autonomy of public col-
leges 1 (1959).
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