COLUMBIA, Mo. – The outgoing Sen. David Pearce, R-Warrensburg, held a ceremony Friday with leaders from the University of Missouri, Moberly Area Community College and the Associated Students of the University of Missouri (ASUM) to celebrate the signing of SB 997 by Gov. Jay Nixon last week.
The bill covers multiple areas of higher education, becoming something of an omnibus piece of legislation, that nonetheless was incredibly popular, earning a unanimous 30-0 vote in the Senate and a 142-3 vote in the House.
SB 997 primarily ensures an easier transition for students hoping to move their credit between community colleges and four-year universities. Among its many provisions, the new measure will allow any public two-year college to offer postsecondary classes to high school students, provide funds to students seeking dual credit classes, create a core curriculum transfer system that allows credits to transfer easier between universities within the state, and create educational grants for the spouses and children of veterans.
“This is a tremendous piece of legislation… and it’s a culmination of a lot of people working together,” Pearce said. “I want to thank the governor. I think one of his high points has been supporting higher education. This is a home run, and I think those of us that interact with other states, we realize how this is kind of setting the bar for other states.”
For Paula Glover, vice president for instruction at Moberly Area Community College, the bill will serve as a cost-saving measure for prospective and current college students around the state by ensuring that no one has to retake a class due to miscommunication between schools, wasting a students’ time and money.
“With the cost of a college education, it’s just unacceptable to not do what we can to help those students get their college degree,” Glover said.
Steven Chaffin, the executive director of ASUM, saw the bill as a way to make Missouri more competitive with states by ensuring that a student can have a greater ease of opportunity at any public institution of higher education in the state.
“[It’s] going to allow people to graduate faster and get into the work force and for the students who are in high school now in the state of Missouri and who are in high school in other states, it really makes Missouri an excellent state to come to,” Chaffin said. “Any piece of legislation that attracts more students to our state is something that we should absolutely be for.”
Chaffin also believes the bill could be a step towards attracting students back to the University of Missouri campus after a tumultuous year which saw student protests over race, graduate students seeking to unionize and football players boycotting to stand in solidarity with protestors.
