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Reporter William March has covered state and national politics since 1994. Email

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Scott grills universities on “measurable goals”

Posted Oct 18, 2011 by William March

Updated Oct 18, 2011 at 06:49 PM

In what could be a prelude to a move for a controversial new program for administering higher education, Gov. Rick Scott has sent a letter to the presidents of Florida’s public universities telling them to provide him information on their “measurable goals” for teachers, academic programs and the universities themselves, ranging from numbers of classes taught to whether students get jobs.

In the letter, Scott recounts his own personal history, including rising from a lower middle class background and marrying “my high school sweetheart” with whom he bought his first business, a doughnut shop.

He said he wants the university system to work toward making sure “Floridians have all the resources necessary to seek employment” and “the opportunity to obtain the best education for which Florida taxpayers are willing to pay.”

In the letter, Scott mentioned “the Texas proposals,” a system of higher education administration developed by a conservative think tank in Texas that includes abolishing tenure and judging professors based largely on student evaluations. Scott has been distributing copies of the proposal to university administrators.

Scott hasn’t formally proposed adopting the Texas proposal, but says he wants to focus on higher education in the coming legislative session.

The letter included 17 questions, most of them asking for “measurable goals” used by the universities and their results for the last five to 10 years in meeting those goals.

The goals he asks about concern making sure graduates “are meeting the needs of employers”; the number who remain in Florida after graduation; the number of graduates with degrees in areas Scott says matter in the job market, including science, technology, engineering and math; “measurable goals for student success after graduation”; and measuring proficiency in writing and critical thinking.

You can read the letter here .

And you can go here to read a full story, which will appear in tomorrow’s Tampa Tribune.