Arkansas LotteryEducation Reform

Promoting Responsibility: A Closer Look At Lottery Scholarship Reform

After Rep. Nate Bell floated his proposal to reform state lottery scholarships last week, I contacted Professor Robert Steinbuch of Little Rock’s Bowen School of Law.  Steinbuch is an expert on student loan policy, and he had a great deal to say about the lottery’s financing of higher education as well.

Steinbuch generally supports the idea that we are wasting some money in higher education—that we need more accountability, and when a lottery scholarship student drops out of school, someone often should have to repay the funds to the state, with a significant caveat:

“Family calamities and medical illnesses should excuse students from repayment. And if a student flunks out while doing all the right things, he should not have to repay the money.  But if the student fails to take his responsibilities seriously, causing him to flunk out, then he should repay.”

Steinbuch’s proposal, however, also adds a key element:  the determination of responsibility.  That is, “who is at fault for the student’s exit from school?”  The student?  An unforeseen circumstance?  Steinbuch’s answer (at least in some cases): the school.

Steinbuch said students should be held morally responsible for repayment only if their exit from school was their fault.  However, if the student is not at fault and the school essentially acted negligently by admitting an ill-prepared student, the school should be on the hook:

“The institutions should be held responsible.  If a school admits a student despite clear indications that the student will not complete a degree, the institution should be required to refund the money. There are some standard predictors that schools can use to make determinations about a students’ likelihood of success, such as high school GPA & ACT/SAT score, as well as other indicators.”

Steinbuch makes a compelling argument.  Essentially what we have done with state lottery scholarships is to bribe institutions of higher education with taxpayer money to accept higher numbers of students with lower prospects of educational success.

Critics of this approach to holding schools accountable will say that poor students will have ‘artificially depressed’ scores because they come from failing school districts.  Therefore, this approach is discriminatory.  But Steinbuch has a remedy for this as well:

“Schools should be able to absolve themselves from responsibility [for the costs] by placing these students into programs designed to address any incoming shorcomings.  Then if the student still falls, the school can show that it made sufficient efforts designed to bring about success.”

Steinbuch also said he supports the idea of a “contract approach,” as Bell has proposed:

“The terms should be spelled out in advance so there are clear expectations for students.”

Ultimately, Steinbuch said, this is about responsibility.  He’s right.  Did the student act responsibly?  Did the school?  And does the state act responsibly by doling out tens of millions of dollars to students who ultimately drop out, with no programs in place to minimize these losses? ($26 million just last year, according to Rep. Bell)  The answer is a resounding “no.”

We, as a state, should be promoting responsibility in all forms, particularly when the taxpayers are paying for it.  Steinbuch is far from the only law professor who advocates that schools should bear some of the cost for admitting substandard students, and his proposal is a great step in that direction.

 

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3 thoughts on “Promoting Responsibility: A Closer Look At Lottery Scholarship Reform

  • Simplemente Conservador

    He should also be investigating how much money is spent on advertising (television especially) to let folks know of the scholarships and the deadline. If these kids and their parents aren’t intelligent enough to know when free money is available, do we really want to be encouraging them apply. Isn’t letting students know of scholarship opportunities the responsibility of the schools and especially of the guidance counselors in the schools? Why should we spend several hundred thousand dollars to try to get folks to apply for free money. Anyone smart enough to be enrolling in college should be smart enough and have enough gumption to investigate the opportunities for scholarships without the state spending money. Or, we could determine the cost of the advertising and then the cost of all the guidance counselors in our schools and utilize the services of whichever is a lesser cost to the taxpayers.

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