A pair of influential college chancellors asked Congress for regulatory relief on Tuesday, two weeks after they issued a report concluding that colleges are “enmeshed in a jungle of red tape.”
Testifying before the Senate education committee, the chancellors—William E. (Brit) Kirwan, of the University System of Maryland, and Nicholas S. Zeppos, of Vanderbilt University—told lawmakers that compliance costs are driving up college tuition. They urged the committee to roll back some of the rules and take steps to improve the federal rule-making process.
“Many regulations are well conceived to address critically important issues and provide appropriate means of accountability,” said Mr. Kirwan, but “too many regulations are overly complex, confusing, and result in costly compliance efforts.”
The chancellors got a sympathetic ear from the chairman of the committee, Sen. Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican who is himself a former college president. He expressed shock at Vanderbilt’s estimate that it spends almost $150-million—11 percent of its nonclinical expenses—complying with federal rules each year, calling the figure “staggering.” (Vanderbilt declined to share its analysis with The Chronicle.)
“Such waste should be an embarrassment to all of us in the federal government,” he said.
Mr. Alexander, who has said that his “principal goal in higher education is to deregulate it,” told the chancellors he would include many of their recommendations in legislation to reauthorize the Higher Education Act that he will introduce this year. And he promised to work with Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to make additional changes administratively.
“If all of us created this mess, then it is up to all of us to fix it,” he said.
But Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the top Democrat on the panel, cautioned her colleagues against taking deregulation too far. She reminded the panel of its responsibility to ensure that the $150-billion that the government spends annually on colleges and students is “well spent.”
“Of course it’s important to make sure colleges and universities can work efficiently and effectively. And I am open to ways to improve our rule-making process,” she said. “At the same time, it would be a mistake to roll back important protections for faculty, students, and families.”
She said she looked forward to the panel’s next hearing, which will feature students and “more diverse types of institutions.”
Balking at Quid Pro Quo
Tuesday’s hearing focused on the recommendations of a task force that was created by Mr. Alexander and three other senators in late 2013 and led by Mr. Kirwan and Mr. Zeppos. That task force issued a report this month that identified 59 regulations of concern and 10 rules that it found “especially problematic.”
Mr. Alexander praised the report’s clarity and vision on Tuesday, likening it to the influential “Rising Above the Gathering Storm” report. But some critics have dismissed it as self-serving. They point out that the task force consisted entirely of current and former college leaders and lobbyists, and that the report itself was written by the American Council on Education, the nation’s “most visible and influential higher-education association,” according to its website.
On the eve of the hearing, a group of 14 student and consumer groups and unions issued a statement saying the report “represents the views of 16 colleges, not the views of students or taxpayers whom higher-education regulations are designed to protect.”
“It should surprise no one that regulated entities want less regulation and fewer strings attached to the taxpayer funds they receive,” the statement reads.
That criticism didn’t come up during the hearing, though the chancellors took pains to stress that they were not seeking a blank check from Congress. Mr. Kirwan expressed “deep appreciation” for the “enormous” federal investment in student aid and research, and Mr. Zeppos said taxpayers and lawmakers have “the right to know these funds are being spent wisely.”
“We are not here to ask for the deregulation of higher ed,” he said.
The tensest moment of the hearing came when Sen. Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, asked the chancellors if they would commit to reducing their tuitions by the amount of money they would save through regulatory relief.
“This is an area where the federal government could use its leverage to bring down costs for students,” she said. “If we do this, will you pass the savings on to students?”
When the chancellors tried to describe steps they had taken to lower costs, she interrupted them, repeating her question.
“I’m not saying universities are not taking this seriously,” she said. “But if we’re going to make changes, we want to see something on the other side.”
Ultimately, neither chancellor would agree to the quid pro quo, arguing that colleges should be allowed to spend any savings as they see fit. In a meeting with reporters after the hearing, they added that it would be “impractical"—and expensive—to calculate the amount each institution would save through deregulation, and then apply that amount as a per-student tuition reduction.
“It would be a monumental undertaking that would cost more than the savings,” said Mr. Kirwan.
Kelly Field is a senior reporter covering federal higher-education policy. Contact her at kelly.field@chronicle.com. Or follow her on Twitter @kfieldCHE.
