The Wages of Success
At Florida A&M University, about 23 percent of the roughly 11,000 students are from out-of-state, says Ammons. The Florida legislature recently considered a bill that would limit non-resident enrollment to 10 percent, but that measure failed. Instead, state colleges and universities will get no state support for non-residents who are "alternative admits," or who did not meet the first-time enrollment requirements, Ammons says.
To offset that loss in revenue, the university may be allowed to keep the revenue generated from that alternative admit student's tuition, which is roughly $7,000 a year. FAMU must first ask the state that they be allowed to keep those funds. That money normally would be redirected into a pool for distribution to the whole state university system. Ammons says it's still unclear how the change will impact the university, financially or enrollmentwise. The measure that failed could be brought before the state legislature again, and with it the questions of restrictions to access.
"These are some issues that we're continuing to study and look at," Ammons says. "I do believe that it has been shown that if issues come up in one session, there's a great possibility that it may come up in another session.
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