The majority of Florida’s public universities will split a $245 million pot of state money this year based on their annual performance reviews. The University of North Florida, however, did not make the cut.
Schools are rated in 10 categories, including graduation rate, starting salaries for recent grads, student retention and cost.
The top eight universities are rewarded with a share of the state performance fund; UNF, Florida A & M and Florida Gulf Coast fell into this year’s losers bracket.
UNF President John Delaney said pitting a regional school like UNF against a multibillion-dollar research institution like the University of Florida is like comparing apples to oranges.
“I agree with accountability,” he said. “You know, fundamentally you need to measure, but every other place you measure to a peer group and that’s the main component that’s missing from this. Because compared to peers, we’re at the very top.”
Delaney said UNF has earned a share of the state performance fund in two of the past three years.
A second performance fund of $275 million will soon be divvied up among all eleven state universities.
Cyd Hoskinson can be reached at choskinson@wjct.org, 904-358-6351 and on Twitter.com @cydwjctnews
