Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Funds freed; San Marcos, SDSU can add classes - SignOnSanDiego.com

Funds freed; San Marcos, SDSU can add classes - SignOnSanDiego.com


A rare bit of good budgetary news has administrators at San Diego State and Cal State San Marcos preparing to spend millions of dollars in federal stimulus money on additional classes.
Charles B. Reed, chancellor of the California State University system, has announced that $50.9 million will be released to the system’s 23 campuses for the fall.
SDSU is set to receive about $4 million and Cal State San Marcos $1.3 million, campus officials said. They expect the funds will pay for hundreds of new classes, although they haven’t decided which ones.
Course offerings for the CSU system’s 450,000 students were trimmed during the past year because of a $564 million drop in state funding. That has led to overcrowded lecture halls, less individual attention from professors and students not getting the classes they need to graduate.
“Hopefully, this will help to alleviate some of the shortages in classes, and students will be able to make faster progress toward their degree,” Reed said.