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On Wednesday, the Alabama Commission on Higher Education presented its budget request for the 2025 legislative session at a joint legislative budget hearing. In addition to preparing budget recommendations on behalf of the state’s public colleges and universities, ACHE is also responsible for administering financial aid in the state and conducting research on higher education and the workforce in order to inform education policy decisions.
The commission’s Executive Director, Dr. Jim Purcell, presented ACHE’s budget request before the joint committee, detailing the various programs and initiatives which the commission hopes to fund. Purcell announced that ACHE will be requesting $77,859,213 from the Education Trust Fund for the 2025-2026 fiscal year.
ACHE’s budget request includes no increases for operations and management, however, it does include modest increases to “existing cost centers” and additional funding for six new program proposals.
Among the new programs is a “Hunger Free Campus Initiative” which looks to support institutions of higher education in the state in providing food assistance to students in need. The program is inspired by initiatives at Auburn University and the University of Alabama which fundraise to tackle student hunger. In that vein, ACHE requested $200,000 from the ETF which student groups could then access through grant proposals to address hunger at other campuses in the state.
A $250,000 request was also made to fund an Alabama Special Education Rural Teacher scholarship. Purcell explained that the funds would be used to address a shortage of special education teachers in rural areas of the state and to create a cohort-based program for special education teachers and students from rural settings.
$150,000 was requested for cybersecurity insurance to protect sensitive student enrollment records, while $100,000 was requested to allow ACHE to track Alabama high school graduates who attend college or university out-of-state through the National Student Clearinghouse.
ACHE also proposed an additional $100,000 appropriation from the ETF to support the implementation of the Alabama Literacy and Numeracy Acts at the state’s colleges. This proposal was met with pushback from the committee who criticized the Colleges of Education for seemingly being unable to fully implement the standards of the Literacy and Numeracy Acts since their passage. One member of the committee asked, “Why do they need additional money? We give them boatloads of money every year.”
“Perhaps there isn’t support for this particular request,” Purcell responded, eliciting laughter from the committee.
The committee also raised questions over a request of $650,000 for the HBCU Consortium. Specifically, they questioned the exact role and function of the Consortium and how it was different from HBCU Cares, another organization that works with the state’s historically-Black colleges and universities. Purcell explained that the HBCU Consortium has different priorities from HBCU Cares and that this money would support faculty training and the implementation of an accounting certification program for Black students. The committee discussed bringing in a representative from the HBCU Consortium to further examine the organization’s roles and functions before approving the budget line.
ACHE also requested a $1.5 million increase for existing state financial aid programs, including the Alabama Student Assistance Program, the Alabama Student Grant Program, and the Alabama National Guard Scholarship Program. An additional $1 million was requested for STEM teacher recruitment, UTeach, and an additional $200,000 for the Network of Alabama Academic Libraries.
Lastly, Purcell highlighted ACHE’s request for an additional $2 million in funding from the ETF for the (Re)Engage Alabama Grant Program. That funding had previously been supplied by the supplemental budget, however — as the Department of Finance had highlighted at an earlier hearing — Gov. Kay Ivey is not proposing a traditional supplemental appropriations bill for this legislative session.
The (Re)Engage program subsidizes students with unfinished degrees to return to college to complete their certification. With additional funding, ACHE hopes to expand the program’s eligibility to students as young as 22. Currently, the program has a minimum age requirement of 25. Additionally, they hope to expand eligibility to students who have attained an associate’s degree but who wish to go back to school to complete their bachelor’s.
