University of Virginia Library

Stone: UVA Is A Winter Resort For Ivy League Rejects

(Cavalier Daily staff writer
Sons Barnes conducted the
following interviews with State
Sen. William F. Stone of Martinsville
and University President
Edgar F. Shannon Jr.
Monday's edition of The Cavalier
Daily will include on in-depth
follow-up by Mr. Barnes
–ed.)

No legislation imposing
controls on out-of-state
student ratios is forthcoming in
the 1973 Virginia General
Assembly–at least not from
State Sen. William F. Stone of
Martinsville.

Political pressure to lower
out-of-state ratios, however,
has been and will continue to
be felt by the University and
other state supported
institutions with high
out-of-state student
enrollments.

The University with 37 per
cent (1972), Mary Washington
with 30 per cent (1970) and
William and Mary with 26 per
cent (1970) head the list of
schools fighting to keep their
non-resident enrollments at
above-average levels.

The major opponent of the
schools in this battle is the
Legislative Commission on
Higher Education chaired by
Mr. Stone.

Mr. Stone, in an interview
with The Cavalier Daily, said
that he did not favor setting an
arbitrary limit on out-of-state
student percentages, despite his
desire to lower non-resident
enrollment at Virginia's
schools.

"I think it ought to be a
voluntary thing," Mr. Stone
said.

What Mr. Stone does
propose is "to make all
state-supported schools
accountable to a strong State
Council for Higher Education."

Under such a system
state-supported schools would

Out-of-state Enrollment At State Four Year Colleges

                               

Institutions	[*] 1970-71 Percentages
Virginia Military institute	46.7%
University of Virginia	42.1%
Mary Washington College	30.8%
William and Mary	26.2%
Virginia Polytechnic Institute	20.5%
Virginia State College	17.7%
Madison	16.9%
Radford	12.9%
Old Dominion University	12.2%
Virginia Commonwealth University	11.4%
George Mason	8.1%
Norfolk State	7.4%
Longwood	4.8%
Christopher Newport	3.4%
Clinch Valley	3.4%

CD/Sam Barnes

Sen. Stone Accuses University Of "Begging Those Yankees."

be required to go before the
state council each year "to
justify their requests" as to
student percentages, along with
curriculum and capital outlay.

The Council, which would
contain representatives from
every state school, would then
make recommendations on
necessary changes to the
governor and General
Assembly.

Mr. Stone said that
he realized a need to have some
out-of-state students at state
schools.

"I realize there are diverse
interests in every school in the
state. I'd want to leave those
diversities with them and all
their local autonomy with
them," he said.

"I'm not trying to harm the
University or any other school.
I'm just trying to get more
cooperation and coordination
from all the schools as a
whole."

If steps are not taken by the
individual schools, however,
Mr. Stone warned that
something more drastic will
eventually be proposed, but
"not from me," he stressed.

Mr. Stone cited a similar
situation in North Carolina
which eventually resulted in
the state's retracting the local
controls of all state-supported
institutions and placing them
in the hands of a single board
of regents over all state
schools.

"I don't want to do that but
I'm saying if we don't do
something, that's what is going
to happen. The state of
Virginia is going to get
something worse than what I'm
proposing." Mr. Stone said that
he wants to leave the state
schools their basic local
autonomy.

"What I want to do is to
leave the University of Virginia
its Board of Visitors and leave
them their endowment fund
and let them do what they
want with it. Let them set up
their curriculum and all their
internal functions, as long as
it's approved by the State
Council for Higher Education,"
Mr. Stone said.

The Board of Visitor's
did exercise its autonomy
earlier this year in freezing
future out-of-state enrollment
in entering classes at this year's
total. Mr. Stone said he
thought the move was "a help,
but I think you 've got to come
on down and be with the rest
of the schools."

The Board of Visitor's
decision to freeze non-resident
enrollments, coupled with the
effects of expansion to a
student population of 16,000
by 1980, will effect a gradual
reduction in the University's
entering out-of-state student
ratio. Mr. Stone, however, said
he was opposed to such a
method of decreasing
out-of-state ratios.

"As a member of the
Finance Committee of Virginia
I'm going to oppose giving you
any more expansion money
until you take care of your
Virginia students first."

"I think you're big enough. VPI
and U.Va. and Old Dominion
and VCU are more interested
in who's going to be the biggest
than in who's going to be the
best."

Facilities Increased

"They won't have to
increase by a third (at the
University) as far as facilities
go if they let some of those
out-of-state students stay
home."

"If you'd decrease
out-of-state enrollment to 33
per cent you'd have enough
room for 810 more Virginia
students without adding any
more facilities.

"As far as I'm concerned
you're going to have to reduce
the out-of-state enrollment to
somewhere around 25 per cent,
which would be in line with
other schools in the state.

"And you'd still probably
have one of the highest
out-of-state enrollments of any
state university anywhere in
the country," he added.

"You're coming in the right
direction. You have been for
ten years. You just haven't
come low enough yet," he said.

Mr. Stone noted that past
pressure on the University to
lower out-of-state percentages
has brought beneficial results.

Enrollment Bill Defeated

"Some ten years ago I
introduced an out-of-state
enrollment bill which, of
course, was very strongly
opposed by the University of
Virginia and was defeated."

"We didn't intend to pass
the bill. We were just trying to
get more instate students in the
Law school and medical
school."

"At that time the University
of Virginia Law School had 66
and two-thirds percent
out-of-state students. They've
come down now to where
they're 50-50."

"The Law School
enrollment for this year was
first set at 280 students as
entering first-year students–50
per cent out-of-state, 50
per cent in-state."

"I don't know what
happened but after this
legislation had been
introduced, they increased the
class to 310 and added 30
more Virginia students over
there."

"We've done that much
good," he said. Mr. Stone
added, however, that "it ought
to be down there where its
80-20. That's what most state
supported institutions have."

The University has said that
should it be forced to cut back
its out-of-state enrollment it
stands to lose as much as $3
million a year in revenue from
out-of-state tuitions.

"I don't mind voting the $3
million or even $5 million so
long as you take in Virginia
students," Mr. Stone said.

When asked whether such
an appropriation would
necessitate a tax raise, he
commented, "With a $5 billion
budget (the state of Virginia's
total budget) that's peanuts."

State Funds Supplied

Mr. Stone said that he
likewise saw no need for an
increase in tuitions to cover
such losses in funds, since the
deficit could be supplied by
state funds.

Additional losses in revenue
would probably be felt by
University endowment funds
which receive a large part of
their contributions from
out-of-state sources. These
endowment funds, including
the Alumni Fund, the Virginia
Law School Foundation, the
Medical Alumni Foundation
and others have been
responsible, either entirely or
partially, for at least 40
buildings and facilities in
Charlottesville, totaling about
$21.6 million.

According to fund totals
from 1971, which Alumni Fund
Director Clay Delauney said
are indicative of past years,
sixty-three per cent of alumni
funds came from out-of-state
sources.

These figures have been
noted by the University as
evidence of the continuing
support of out-of-state alumni
after graduation. Mr. Stone
termed these figures "an
indictment of the loyalty of
your own (the University's)
alumni here in the state."

"I think that's horrible to
admit that here's the
University of Virginia and
they're begging money from
those Yankees up there
(out-of-state alumni from
northern states) rather than
contributing to their own
school here at home."

"What you're saying in an
indirect way is that they're
bribing their way in here."

"Don't you think that at a
University of Virginia and not
a University at Virginia the
bulk of the funds should come
from the alumni in-state?"

Mr. Stone also questioned
whether alumni funds were
actually being used for such
projects as building programs.
"It's my understanding they
use it for fringe benefits over
there, for a lot of things ––
maybe to hire Harrison Davis. I
don't know yet, but I'm going
to find out," he said.

Other endowment totals for
the Law School show that over
80 percent of total
contributions since 1965 have

CD/Steve Wells

Sen. Stone (third from left) Chairing Commission's First Public Hearing, October 23