Utah colleges face budget cuts despite record enrollment

Utah public colleges are having an unusually good year.

While most state higher education systems faced enrollment drop-offs amid a storm of factors—demographic declines, doubts about the value of a college degree and the botched FAFSA rollout—enrollment jumped at every public institution in Utah this fall for the first time in more than a decade. Overall head count grew by 4.3 percent, the Utah System of Higher Education’s largest ever year-over-year increase, adding about 8,500 new students statewide.

Yet despite the record growth, state lawmakers in Utah have proposed massive budget cuts for higher ed. House Speaker Mike Schultz, a Republican, told The Salt Lake Tribune that the Legislature was exploring cuts of around 10 percent across all 16 of the state’s public colleges and universities in 2025, a big leap from the 1.5 percent cut they implemented in the spring.

To justify the cuts, Schultz cited projected demographic declines and misalignment with workforce needs, problems he said the state could prepare for by reallocating funds to “high-impact” degree programs and anticipating diminished student needs.

“We’re working to optimize our higher education system to maximize the return on investment for students and taxpayers,” he wrote in an email to Inside Higher Ed.

But students in Utah are buying into their public universities more than ever. The flagship University of Utah marked its fifth straight year of enrollment growth, adding about 1,600 new students to its 36,000-strong student body. Utah Valley University admitted its largest ever incoming class, with overall enrollment growing by 4.8 percent. First-year enrollment surged by 15 percent at Weber State University and overall head count increased by 7 percent; last year they rose by 8 percent and 2 percent, respectively.

Weber State president Brad Mortensen told Inside Higher Ed that while he attributes the college’s growth to a number of factors, including a comparatively high average return on investment, new affordability initiatives enabled by state funds were a major driver.

Last winter the Utah State Higher Education board waived application fees at all of its member colleges, which Mortensen said drove applications up more than anyone expected. Funds freed up by the board also helped Weber avoid the more dire enrollment consequences of last cycle’s FAFSA fiasco, allowing it to backfill financial aid packages with state money when federal aid was up in the air.

Tom Harnisch, vice president for government relations at the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association, said he couldn’t predict whether the Utah Legislature would move forward with the cuts on the table.

“State legislative leaders may put out a statement that’s critical of higher education in order to satisfy their caucus, but at the end of the day it may not be reflected in policy,” he said.

Substantial enrollment growth doesn’t just mean more tuition dollars; it also means more institutional expenses for support services, housing and financial aid. If the Legislature goes through with the proposed cuts, Harnisch said, it would be a blow to the system’s momentum.

“A 10 percent reduction after rapid enrollment growth would be a big step backward,” he said.

A spokesperson for Schultz said his office is actively working with the state Board of Education to hammer out details on where funding will be pared down, and by how much.

Changing—not Shrinking—Demographics

Many states are staring down imminent demographic declines among high school graduates, predicted as soon as 2026.

“It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to [see] there’s this cliff coming,” Schultz told The Salt Lake Tribune. “We’ve got to get ahead of it.”

But Utah, with its growing Hispanic population and strong economy, is different. When Schultz said Utah higher ed should be prepared for demographic declines, he cited a report that predicts the state’s demographic cliff—the report calls it a “dip” to avoid overselling the extent of the downturn—won’t come until 2032.

That’s a long way off for the coming budget cycle to have much of an impact. And many Utah colleges expanded their typical student demographic picture this fall: UVU alone saw an 18 percent increase in first-generation students, with jumps of 8 percent in Latino students, 13 percent in Native American students and 5 percent in adult learners, according to system data.

Those are all students for whom affordability and resources are a major factor in college attendance. Slashing higher ed spending in the middle of a boom period could hamstring colleges like UVU and Weber State.

“We’re going to keep seeing big increases [in enrollments] for the next two or three years. Then it may slow down, but there will still be growth,” Mortensen said. “We actually need to expand our capabilities in the short term. We just need to do it in a smart way so we’re not overextended when the dip comes.”

Harnisch said state funding decisions are more complicated than apportioning for institutional growth or contraction. He sees Schultz’s proposal in the context of a nationwide reckoning with the changing role of public higher education.

“Utah is having a conversation about the needs of the state and whether they’re making the best use of their resources,” he said. “That can’t only happen in states with poor demographic trends.”

A Matter of Priorities

Schultz argued that workforce shortages necessitated a reallocation of funding to programs that feed into high-need areas of the state economy, like health care. Mortensen said meeting those needs requires more investment in public higher ed, not less. He believes lawmakers will see this fall’s enrollment growth as a sign of robust health for the state system and come to the same conclusion. Still, he knows colleges will have to make their case.

“There are certainly things that have been proposed that have us paying attention,” he said.

Tanisha Pruitt, a researcher focusing on education and state budget issues at the nonpartisan institute Policy Matters Ohio, said she wouldn’t be so confident.

“It’s a post facto justification,” she said. “[Lawmakers] are not thinking too hard about demographics. They’re saying, ‘We’re going to move some money from this bucket into this other one’ and giving a reason after they’ve decided.”

Utah isn’t the only state facing possible budget cuts after strong enrollment returns. Public university enrollment in Ohio increased by about 3.5 percent this fall, yet the Republican-controlled Legislature put forth significant budget cuts, in part to adjust for projected demographic downturns.

Some of these cuts are also due to a major swing from booming budget surpluses last year to a tighter finances this year, which has affected much of the country as the last of the COVID-19 pandemic stimulus money drains out of state coffers. But many states have impaired their spending capacities by passing large tax cuts, Harnisch said, and there’s simply less money for higher ed left in the pot.

Pruitt said it all comes down to priorities. States can meet the needs of growing populations of first-generation and nontraditional students, many of whom require more financial and auxiliary support to graduate. Or they can discard those initiatives in favor of things like tax cuts and career training.

But unless state lawmakers commit to funding programs to expand college access, Pruitt said, their enrollment and workforce concerns could be a self-fulling prophecy.

“We’re going to see enrollments stagger and contract, but not just because of demographics,” she said. “It will be because there was not enough state support.”