Massachusetts Teachers Association President Max Page issued the following statement on the Board of Higher Education vote on 90-credit bachelor's degrees:
On behalf of the 117,000 members of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, I condemn the state Board of Higher Education’s rushed vote today, approving watered-down bachelor’s degrees for Merrimack College and Suffolk University. The board refused to listen to our concerns, including of faculty who presented nearly 100 detailed analyses of the problematic proposals and broader testimonies about how these degrees will hurt students and our campuses. These analyses were augmented by 300 additional testimonies, with only one favoring the three-year degrees, and an online petition with 1,160 signatures.
The board’s actions are especially troubling given the Fair Share Amendment's progress toward making public higher education debt-free – with free community college for all and free four-year universities for lower-income students. The sub-par, reduced credit degrees that the BHE approved threaten to create a two-tier higher education system in Massachusetts, one that increases racial and economic inequities, erodes our state’s reputation for academic excellence, and leaves recipients under-qualified for graduate study or a workforce increasingly shaped by artificial intelligence. We will continue to oppose these harmful degrees.
Learn more about the No90 campaign at massteacher.org/no90.
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