Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 6, 1993 TAG: 9302060204
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: From wire and staff reports
DATELINE: RICHMOND LENGTH: Medium
COLLEGES PUSHED TO TAKE TRANSFERS
State legislators are turning up the heat on Virginia's university presidents to accept more transfer students from community colleges.The House Education Committee killed a bill Friday that would have capped out-of-state enrollment in state universities at 25 percent, theoretically making more room for community college transfer students.
But committee members warned that they might reconsider a cap next year if universities do not act to serve more of the burgeoning college-age population. An estimated 65,000 additional Virginia students are expected to seek higher education by 2001, a 30 percent increase from 1991.
Legislators said they worry that if students don't have a good shot at transferring from community colleges to four-year schools, they will not attend college at all. Community colleges play a large role in the State Council of Higher Education's plan to handle the enrollment spurt.
Two universities, Norfolk's Old Dominion and George Mason in Fairfax, have adopted comprehensive plans for accepting community-college transfers.
Some of the state's more prestigious four-year schools, however, accept far fewer community college students, particularly those from Southwest Virginia, said Del. Ford Quillen, D-Gate City.
Using figures compiled by the state council, Quillen said that this fall, William and Mary had 43 transfer students from community colleges, the University of Virginia had 153 and Virginia Military Institute had only seven. ODU accepted 460 community college transfers and George Mason 1,046.
In other General Assembly business Friday:
The Senate passed a bill that would allow residents of unzoned districts in Franklin County to vote on land-use zoning.
Residents of the Blue Ridge, Blackwater and Snow Creek voting districts would be permitted to vote in advisory referendums if a companion bill is approved by the House.
The House of Delegates approved a bill that would enable Virginia's localities to require train locomotives sound their whistles at certain trestles and bridges.
The bill, sponsored by Del. Ward Armstrong, D-Martinsville, is in response to the deaths last August of two Henry County teen-agers on a trestle south of Martinsville.
The Senate gave preliminary approval to an amendment to the state constitution. It would allow localities with elected school boards to grant those boards taxing authority, if the proposal is approved in referendum and later by the General Assembly.
The proposed amendment cannot take effect unless it is approved by the House of Delegates this year, then again next year by the Senate and House.