Ch. 246

LAWS OF MARYLAND

CHAPTER 246

(Senate Bill 459)

AN ACT concerning

Administration Action Plan for Higher Education - 1988

FOR the purpose of reforming the system of coordination and
governance of the institutions and segments of higher
education in the State of Maryland; establishing the
Maryland Charter for Higher Education that sets forth a
statement of public policy for public postsecondary colleges
and universities in the State and establishes the principles
on which postsecondary education in Maryland is should be
based; abolishing the State Board for Higher Education and
replacing that Board with the Maryland Higher Education
Commission (Commission); providing for the membership,
qualifications, compensation, terms, and officers of the
Commission; providing for a Commissioner Secretary of Higher
Education appointed by the Governor and subject to the
advice and consent of the Senate of Maryland; providing for
the powers, duties, salary, and staffing authority of the
Secretary of Higher Education; providing for the powers of
the Commission over the growth and development of
postsecondary education in the State, missions, certificates
of approval, the College Park campus of the University of
Maryland and the institutions of the University of Maryland
in the Baltimore region, equal educational opportunity,
research, budgets, the review of educational programs, and
other areas of responsibility; requiring the governing
boards of the public colleges and universities in the State
and certain agencies to submit to the Commission for review
their annual operating budget requests and proposals for
capital projects; requiring the Commission, in consultation
with the department of Budget and fiscal Planning, to
present to the Governor, on or before a certain date, a
consolidated operating and capital budget for higher
education that includes certain information; requiring the
Commission to comment on the overall level of funding for
higher education; authorizing the Commission to comment
regarding funding priorities among the segments of higher
education; requiring the Governor to include in the annual
budget for a certain fiscal year a certain amount of general
fund support; providing that for a certain fiscal year and
each fiscal year thereafter, it is the goal of the State
that public senior higher education institutions be funded
at a level at least equal to a certain percentage of the
funding guidelines set by the Commission; at least certain
amounts of general fund State support for each public senior
higher education institution; requiring the president of
each public institution of higher education to develop a
mission statement, a performance accountability plan, and a

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