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F I S C A L I M P A C T R E P O R T

SPONSOR Nava

ORIGINAL DATE

LAST UPDATED

1/24/07

HB

SHORT TITLE NMSU Partnership for Diverse Faculty

SB 28

ANALYST Guambaña

APPROPRIATION (dollars in thousands)

Appropriation

Recurring

or Non-Rec

Fund

Affected

FY07

FY08

$1,000.0

Recurring

General Fund

(Parenthesis ( ) Indicate Expenditure Decreases)

Duplicates House Bill 106

SOURCES OF INFORMATION

LFC Files

Responses Received From

New Mexico State University (NMSU)

New Mexico Higher Education Department (NMHED

SUMMARY

Synopsis of Bill

Senate Bill 28 appropriates $1,000,000 from the General Fund to NMSU for the purpose of the

Advance Partnership for Diverse Faculty Program.

FISCAL IMPLICATIONS

The appropriation of $1,000,000 contained in Senate Bill 28 is a recurring expense to the

General Fund. Any unexpended or unencumbered balance remaining at the end of 2008 shall

revert to the General Fund.

SIGNIFICANT ISSUES

NMSU and NMHED equally assert that the NMSU ADVANCE Institutional Transformation

(IT) was established in 2002 by an $3.7 million given by the National Science Foundation (NSF)

grant. NMSU does not fund the ADVANCE program. ADVANCE IT was originally intended to

Senate Bill 28 – Page

2

attract high level female faculty to NMSU. By the end of 2005, this goal had been surpassed,

with the percentage of STEM female faculty increased by 46.7%. Senate Bill 28 expands the

opportunity to include underrepresented minorities as well as women. Senate Bill 28 will not

supplement the current operating budget as the NSF grant will expire in December 2007.

Senate Bill 28 appropriates $1,000,000 from the General Fund to NMSU to be split equally

among NMSU, New Mexico Tech (NMT), and the University of New Mexico (UNM) for the

purpose of improving recruitment and retention of diverse, high-demand faculty with direct

relation to the soon-to-be-expired grant awarded to ADVANCE Institutional Transformation

(IT). The funds will be used to purchase state-of-the-art equipment and supplies for the Science,

Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) fields in an effort to continue to attract

minorities in faculty positions for the ADVANCE IT.

The nationwide concern with diversity in academia combined with different levels of "candidate

availability" means that NMSU, UNM, as well as NMT must compete with every other doctoral

institution for excellent women and minority candidates. Because ethnic minority Ph.D.s are

scarce across most academic fields, and the representation of women among doctoral recipients

varies greatly with fewer women in fields like engineering and computer science, it is essential to

provide state-of-the-art instrumentation and lab set-up costs for candidates in the natural and

physical sciences and engineering. These enhanced start-up packages will position New Mexico

to compete nationally and to retain the best talent to protect the state’s investment in faculty.

This proposal was submitted to the Higher Education Department by NMSU but was not

included in the Department’s funding recommendation for FY08.

PERFORMANCE IMPLICATIONS

The augmentation of start-up packages for new faculty has enabled NMSU to double the number

of women hired in the science and engineering fields. This funding request seeks to expand this

approach across NM doctoral-granting institutions -- NMSU, NMT, and UNM -- so that

excellent, high-demand diverse faculty are attracted to NM to conduct their world-class research

here and mentor our New Mexican students to pursue science and engineering fields, thus

contributing to the state’s economic development

.

CONFLICT, DUPLICATION, COMPANIONSHIP, RELATIONSHIP

SB 28 is a duplicate of HB 106.

TECHNICAL ISSUES

This bill calls for initiatives to recruit and retain highly sought after faculty of underrepresented

groups in Science, Technology, Engineering, & Math disciplines.

AG/mt