CHAMPAIGN — Gov. Bruce Rauner signed legislation today creating a merit-based scholarship program for Illinois students and a task force to help share college and career interest data between high schools and higher education institutions. Both initiatives are products of the Higher Education Working Group focused on making the state’s colleges and universities more affordable and accessible for Illinois students.
“Our future as a state is dependent upon people wanting to live, work and attend school here in Illinois,” Rauner said. “We want to create a place where our young people want to learn and put what they have learned into practice through careers that enrich our economy and make Illinois a better place to live.”
From 1991 to 2014, enrollment at Illinois public universities and community colleges declined by 50,000 students, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. From 2011 to 2016, undergraduate enrollment at Illinois public universities fell 5,127 students, a decline of more than 8 percent.
“For too long, our ‘best and brightest’ have been leaving Illinois,” said Sen. Chapin Rose, R-Mahomet. “This brain drain and enrollment decline has not only devastated several of our universities and the communities they sit in, it also has hurt Illinois’ future as these students do not return. They instead pay taxes elsewhere, create, invent, and move another state’s economy forward with their work and efforts. People think that this is a new phenomenon. It is not. Demand for public higher education has been sliding for over 25 years, and we have been a net exporter of intellectual talent since the 1970s. It was well past time for the General Assembly to stand up and lead on this issue.”
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