(Photo Courtesy of MATC)

Leaders of the Wisconsin Technical College System (WTCS) laid out the system’s requests for the 2025-27 state budget to support college operations  and students’ education during a Thursday legislative briefing.

Education funding will likely be a major point of debate in the upcoming budget process, with public K-12 schools, the UW System and the technical colleges all requesting increases. The technical college system is made up of 16 colleges across the state serving about 287,000 students each year who pursue associate degrees, technical diplomas or short-term certificates. 

The technical college system’s budget for 2024-25 totaled about $1.3 billion, with $592.9 million — or 44% — coming from state aid. About 17% of the remainder comes from tuition and fees and 39% comes from property taxes.

“We are very lean overall in terms of our overall funding picture… we have to be because funding is always limited resources,” said system President Layla Merrifield, who started in the position in September 2024. 

The system’s increase would add up to just under $60 million in general purpose revenue, according to a Department of Administration summary.

According to the system, about 70% of the funding would be distributed based on a formula and 30% would be distributed based on outcomes. 

WTCS policy advisor Megan Stritchko said the request is about 4% of the current budget and is meant to help expand capacity for the technical colleges to meet employer demand across a wide variety of industries. The funding would then be able to be used by each college to meet its “unique needs,” Stritchko said. 

“The colleges are hearing from really all the employers in their district just looking for skilled labor, and so this is to help with capacity to meet that demand,” Stritchko said. “It’s also to help with expanding the pipeline of talent so trying to bring more folks into the technical college system — get them trained up, get them a credential and get them out into the workforce, and then supporting those students while they’re within the colleges and helping ensure that they’re successful.”

Stritchko noted that technical colleges have been facing rising costs, including because of rapidly advancing technology. 

The system is requesting $700,000 in general purpose funds for positions in the Technical College System office and for information technology and security to maintain the system’s operations and enable continuous improvement in outcomes. Merrifield said the office helps coordinate the work of the system.

“We are currently funded at the same level we were funded at 20 years ago,” Merrifield said. “Everything that we do is database decision making. We really try to take in all of this great data from our colleges and then turn it into something useful, and give it back to them so that they know how they can improve relative to their fellow colleges. All of that requires resources.” 

Part of the request includes $3 million across the biennium to provide grants to colleges for teaching and learning materials that are in the public domain or have been released under an intellectual property license that permits their free use. The system has said the investment would help to reduce the cost of education as students across the system can access those resources, making it more affordable and accessible.

“These textbooks need to be maintained and they need to be updated regularly, just like when you had books, when you’re in school, there are version one, version two, version three and they all need to be updated,” WTCS policy advisor Brandon Trujillo said, adding that the system has identified nursing and automotive as some programs where students would benefit from available materials.

The system is also seeking $10 million across the biennium to prepare students and educators for the adoption of artificial intelligence in the classroom and the workforce.

The system is also requesting $10.8 million in each year of the biennium to go towards Wisconsin Grants, administered by the Wisconsin Higher Educational Aids Board. The program  provides grants to undergraduate Wisconsin residents enrolled at least half-time in degree or certificate programs. 

According to the system, for the first time in over 10 years there has been a waitlist for the grants, with about 3,200 students by the end of fiscal year 2023-24. It is projected that the waitlist will grow significantly in FY 2024-25 due to changes in the federal formula for determining a student’s financial need. 

“We’re seeing student need increase across our system and it’s going to continue to increase,”  Trujillo said. 

While Wisconsin’s state agencies have submitted their budget requests, Gov. Tony Evers will deliver his budget address and release his complete budget proposal next month. The budget will be in the hands of state lawmakers.