LANSING – The Tuition Grant program will likely see the same increase for the 2014-15 fiscal year as the state’s 15 public universities.

Sen. Tonya Schuitmaker (R-Lawton), chair of the Senate Appropriations Higher Education Subcommittee, said Monday the higher education increase would be at 6.1 percent including the Tuition Grant Program.

Other sources were not as certain, but the expectation is it will be somewhere between the 5.6 percent boost approved by the House and the 6.1 percent hike recommended by Governor Rick Snyder and passed by the Senate.

Like Snyder, the Senate did not approve an increase for the Tuition Grant program, which provides scholarships on a need basis to students at private colleges and universities. The House passed a 5.6 percent increase, in line with the increase it passed for operational aid to the 15 public universities.

How big an increase was not exactly clear. Rep. Al Pscholka (R-Stevensville), the chair of the House Appropriations Higher Education Subcommittee, could not immediately be reached Monday evening.

Nor was it clear where the funds to fund the roughly $1.9 million increase to the Tuition Grant program would come from. There was some talk it would be shifted out of the university operational aid, but others following the budget said there had been a commitment that would not happen.

And the numbers are still not entirely certain as Snyder, Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville (R-Monroe) and House Speaker Jase Bolger (R-Marshall) have yet to sign off on an overall budget target. Richardville spokesperson Amber McCann said that will hopefully happen Tuesday.

Robert LeFevre, president of the Association of Independent Colleges and Universities of Michigan (which lobbies on behalf of the private tuition grant program) said he and his group have requested both the administration and the Legislature increase the program by the same percentage as that of the state’s public universities after seeing slashed funding over the last decade.

“Ten years ago, the program was (appropriated) roughly $64 million,” LeFevre said. “Over the past decade, it has been significantly reduced to about $32 million.”

The grants are available to undergraduate students and Michigan residents that are Pell-eligible, and amount to about $1,524 per pupil, LeFevre said.

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