State lawmakers voted Thursday to provide the Universities of Wisconsin $32 million to target workforce development in high-demand fields like engineering and computer science, ending a long-running budget standoff.
The funding was initially withheld by legislative budget writers last year and set aside to be released to the UW system campuses after they detailed their plan to use the money to help fill jobs in high-need fields, rather than toward diversity, equity and inclusion programming.
Announced in November, the proposal splits the $32 million among the system’s 13 four-year schools. All universities would use the funding toward educating students in four fields: engineering; nursing and health care; business and finance; and computer and data science.
The plan comes after Republican lawmakers pulled out $32 million from the UW system budget — roughly the amount the state’s public universities spend on diversity, equity and inclusion positions — and required the money be spent on efforts to bolster the state’s workforce.
UW system’s workforce development proposal would allocate about $2.5 million each to UW-Madison and UW-Milwaukee annually for the biennium, with the other 11 four-year schools receiving $1 million each.
The plan is expected to add over 9,300 graduates in the four focus areas in a five-year period, according to the UW system.
Legislators on the Joint Finance Committee still had to sign off on releasing the funds to the UW and did so only after debate on the Legislature’s treatment of the state’s public university system.
The $32 million was part of a deal reached between the UW system administrators and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, over curbing DEI efforts on campus, which Vos had used as justification to oppose funding increases for the universities.
Sen. Kelda Roys, D-Madison, argued the funding plan still does not make UW-Madison whole for money that had been shaved off of its budget previously.
This drew pushback from Republicans, who argued that they were merely approving the UW system’s request without any sort of change, meaning they were not responsible for how funding was allocated to the flagship campus.
“We challenged them to step up on workforce; they brought us a plan and we’re accepting it,” said Rep. Mark Born, R-Beaver Dam, who is also the committee’s co-chair.
Roys argued the UW offered the plan only because GOP lawmakers had initially held the funding “hostage” and told the system to “come back on your knees and maybe we’ll think about funding it.”
“The plan before it is not what the university requested,” Roys said. “It is not what they require, it is not what they deserve to be able to do their best job for University of Wisconsin students.”
The committee’s vote is one of the last moves by the Legislature in holding up their end of the deal with the UW.
A legislative committee met in December to approve pay raises for thousands of UW faculty and staff. Lawmakers also sent a funding package to Gov. Tony Evers last week to support a new engineering building at UW-Madison, as well as renovating other buildings on campus.
Rep. Tip McGuire, D-Kenosha, said the delays in reaching the deal meant faculty and staff went months without their promised pay raises, noting that the debate came at a time when many universities have been cutting staff in recent months.
“There are so many people whose lives have been negatively impacted by this delay for ultimately what amounts to a political talking point for Republicans, for their base,” he said.
