By Gregory Hinckley
Oregon business and the state’s economy depend on a highly educated workforce. We all know the benefits of having well-trained professionals and technical specialists with a diversity of experience and backgrounds. At the same time, hiring employees educated in this state offers a particular advantage, because the latter are more invested in Oregon and understand the state’s needs and its sometimes quirky ways. For the best employment outcomes, we need a balance of these two groups.
But right now we are not getting enough Oregon-educated employees. That’s because not enough are being educated here.
Any business owner knows you must invest to ensure a successful enterprise. Yet Oregon has not invested in one of our most important assets: our public universities. Out of 50 states, we rank 45th when it comes to state support for our universities.
That’s not just embarrassing. It hurts efforts to keep, recruit and grow industry in Oregon. And it has forced universities to raise tuition to levels that cause students to pile up debt or, even worse, decide not to even try to get a college degree. This presents a difficult challenge for the 2017 Oregon Legislature – but also a real opportunity.
Lawmakers already are deep into the job of balancing the two-year state budget, deciding how to spend $20.8 billion in general fund and lottery revenue. The good news is that Oregon’s economy is on the upswing, adding new dollars into state coffers. Presidents of the state’s seven public universities say that with an investment of $100 million above the 2015 allocation, they can keep tuition increases at or below 5 percent. To business leaders like me, this seems like a reasonable investment.
Here’s why.
Our public universities are great incubators of ideas, innovations, research and graduates who serve our cities and mobilize our economy. They have produced Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners, start-ups that grew into multinational corporations, urban thinkers who transformed our biggest city into one of the world’s most livable places. More importantly, they provide opportunity for all students to move up the economic ladder and participate in all this state has to offer.
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My hometown university in particular, Portland State, is one of those great working-class colleges that educates a disproportionate number of first-generation students, students of color and low-income students, and helps them achieve dreams once considered impossible.
Oregon’s economy is humming, ahead of the nation. Unemployment has plummeted. Income is rising. People are moving here more than to almost any other state. These are signs we should all be proud of. The fastest way to kill that momentum, however, is to send the message that we don’t care much about our universities.
Lawmakers face difficult decisions in the coming weeks and months. Investing in an educated workforce has got to be a top priority if we wish Oregon to prosper. Keeping our universities flourishing is necessary to keep our state moving forward.
Gregory Hinckley is president of Mentor Graphics, based in Wilsonville.
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