Mr. WHEELER. Not actually categories, but an actual continuum. Projects are rated under, for example, in our State we have 13 priority criteria. An institution gets a number of points under each. These are then totaled. The project amassing the greatest number of points has the first claim on the Federal funds, and so on down the scale.

Mr. DELLENBACK. You don't put them within groupings then, class I groupings, or class II, or class III, or class (A), or class (C), or something along that line?

Mr. WHEELER. No, sir, it is a continuum. I might say on that point, however, that in the application process we do not receive an application until the institution has completed the academic program and preliminary drawings for the facility, so this means that the institution has enough felt need for the facility that they have already made a substantial investment in planning for it.

Mr. DELLENBACK. As far as the 1202 commissions are concerned, Mr. Wheeler, do I interpret your remark on page 9 of your testimony that you are pleased the issue paper strictly construes section 1202 in requiring adequate representation of all elements in postsecondary education in opposition to Mr. McGuinness' expressed view that it ought to be in the first-line input, or at least there are certain dangers to having narrow segmented groups represented rather than the general public?

Mr. WHEELER. I think, Congressman Dellenback, there is a basic philosophical disagreement perhaps in the higher education community that Mr. McGuinness alluded to on this point. I view the section 1202 commission as purely a planning vehicle. My own concept of the intent of the Congress here was to bring all segments of higher education together, or postsecondary education together around the table and, therefore, I do not think we get into issues of coordination and issues of governance with respect to the 1202 commission, and I believe, when Mr. McGuinness expressed those concerns, that he was bringing those factors into the conversation.

Mr. DELLENBACK. You approve of the idea of the 1202 commission having direct first-line representation from each of the component elements?

Mr. WHEELER. I do; yes sir.

Mr. DELLENBACK. Discussed in our legislation?

Mr. WHEELER. Yes, sir.

Mr. DELLENBACK. Then one last question. Without 1202 being implemented, is any change in law necessary for a commission like yours to continue as you see it? Can you continue under the present law? Is it obviated by the language of 1202?

Mr. WHEELER. There is the ambiguity in the authorizing language, which Mr. McGuinness referred to, and I argue that 1202 and 1203 can be broadly construed to cover authorization of administrative funding for State facilities commissions. I understand that both the House and Senate committee staffs are essentially in agreement with this contention. However, there is an ambiguity and the type of technical amendment that Mr. McGuinness referred to might be desirable.

Mr. DELLENBACK. If either in the 1973 or 1974 budget there weren't any funds that were made available for construction, would your commission wither on the vine, if they were not made available?

Mr. WHEELER. I think there will certainly be a tendency in this direction, a tendency, and I mentioned already there is a trend toward the integration of the facilities commissions with the general State higher education agencies, and I basically don't object to this. I think it ought to be a State decision.

Mr. DELLENBACK. Thank you, Mr. Wheeler.

Mr. O'HARA. Mr. Huber.

Mr. HUBER. I was interested in the testimony on page 6, the national facilities inventory is over 1.2 billion assignable square feet with a cost of over $69 billion. What all is included in that inventory? How deep does it go?

Mr. WHEELER. It is literally all academic space down to the last bit, and it does include the college housing, auxiliary enterprises, everything that goes to make up the college plant.

Mr. HUBER. How many institutions do you think would be in that? Do you have any idea?

Mr. WHEELER. This is the traditional National Center for Higher Education Statistics universe, which runs, as I recall, about 2850 institutions.

Mr. HUBER. Twenty-eight hundred and fifty, that is public, private, the whole gamut?

Mr. WHEELER. Yes.

Mr. HUBER. You mentioned something about 1.2 billion assignable square feet.

Mr. WHEELER. This is a net figure of actual usable space that does not include corridors, janitors closets, mechanical space, and the like. Mr. HUBER. So there is another 0.6 billion of extra space?

Mr. WHEELER. Yes; about the ratio of two-thirds usable space.

Mr. HUBER. You made one other comment I was interested in. You talked about educational facilities where the priority system was based upon overcrowding. How prevalent do you find it to be, the overcrowding in facility?

Mr. WHEELER. It, of course, is admittedly less prevalent now than it was in 1963 when the act was passed. In the highly urbanized States we still find some crowded institutions and the same is true in some areas of the Southeast where the college-going rate has tended to lag behind some of the rest of the country and institutions are catching up, so to speak.

Mr. HUBER. Is there a trend that has been plotted to show at what point that line will cross the point of noncrowding? Is there anything like that? Would you forecast, if the present situation continues, at what time you think we will have eliminated completely the crowding and we will then be going into a negative sort of position where we may have an excess of facilities? Is there any kind of timetable on that?

Mr. WHEELER. There, of course, are many projections at the present time that indicate, or which indicate that enrollments will be stabilized or dropped slightly around 1979 or 1980. However, we do, according to the most commonly used and acceptable space standards, at this point have a deficit of space at the present time, and speaking strictly now of academic space and not all of the space at institutions,

that is leaving out residential, auxiliary and so on, and we have, as I recall, some 66 million square feet of space coming off of the inventory every year, by reason of obsolescence, even if you assume a useful lifetime for a building of some 60 years.

Mr. HUBER. Why did you say only 20 million were removed from the inventory in 1970-71 if it were 60? That is on page 6.

Mr. WHEELER. The 20 million was an actual figure for that year, and I think—or my assumption of 60 years probably means that we are using academic buildings longer than 60 years, and then of course we do have in the inventory a great, a relatively large amount of space that has been constructed in the last 20 years, so what I am using here is a long-term averaging figure.

Mr. HUBER. You just touched on the problem of the living accommodations. Is it true that many of the institutions are finding surplus because of the lack of students or willingness to live on campus?

Mr. WHEELER. This is a problem at this point. We are receiving substantial numbers of projects now where the institutions are proposing to convert residential space to academic use because they need it worse for faculty office space and the like. One of our institutions at North Carolina has recently closed two dormitories.

This tends to be a problem in the large public institutions predominantly, according to national surveys.

Mr. HUBER. A growing problem?

Mr. WHEELER. It has been, for a number of years, a serious problem. I would hesitate to say that it is a growing problem, because I think we can see some trends in the other direction now. It is a mixture, I think, frankly, at this point.

Mr. HUBER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. O'HARA. Mr. Quie.

Mr. QUIE. I have just one question. That is, since we passed the higher education amendment last year, I noticed that some States had started out with their coordinating commissions, their councils, as being professionals from the various higher educational institutions and subsequently changed to be practically entirely lay boards. What have you done in your analyzing of the various States in regards to the lay people on it, compared to the professionals from institutions of higher education?

Mr. WHEELER. You are speaking now of facilities commissions? Mr. QUIE. Facilities commissions, right.

Mr. WHEELER. The facilities commissions are almost invariably lay people. They are a representation-taking my own commission, for example-they are a representation of private institutions which comes from trustees and individuals at this level closely associated with private higher education.

Mr. QUIE. Do you think there will be a tendency to go away from that move relative to commissions and set up the way it appears to be moving with the guidelines coming out?

Mr. WHEELER. It is difficult to say on that, Congressman Quie, because, as I read the guidelines, either type of individual will qualify; that is, a president could represent private higher education or public community colleges, a trustee certainly could, and so on. I would suspect in that regard we will continue to have a mixed pattern.

who in the past have been widely locked out of the system by financial hardship: it charts for higher education still another larger challenge, which is to build programs that are more relevant to the nontraditional students and programs that not only provide more learning options for the student but at the same time serve broader national needs. These are directions in which the community college has been moving for some time. We are pleased that they are reaffirmed and intensified in national policy, by the 1972 amendments.

Mr. Chairman, we have read with great interest your own recent statements making clear that the first order of business in national policy for higher education is to get as much as possible of the 1972 legislation implemented and funded. We couldn't agree more.

For example, the entitlement principle in student aid, which now takes the form of the basic educational opportunity grants, is an approach that the Congress, the administration, and the higher education community all worked for. To work well, BOG will have to be well funded. In the face of agonizing budget pressures, the administration has recognized this, and made requests that would get BOG off to a good start in the next 2 academic years.

If BOG does run well, we believe it will change, expand, and strengthen higher education. It will change the colleges' constituency. It will alter the programing. It can bring the outputs of higher education into better balance within the economy and the job opportunities of the next decade. It could bring more balance and harmony to the whole system.

We are convinced that it will smooth the road for the transfer student, and that every segment of postsecondary training will benefit. In sum, student aid thus has to stand as our biggest priority.

Those are some of our general reactions to this great bill. We have some very specific concerns about getting key parts of it moving. Certainly the Office of Education could have moved faster in developing the regulations and specifications to carry out every part of the act. We know that tens of thousands of students will suffer because progress has been so slow on regulations for the student aid programs. Obviously the colleges will suffer too. With the current school year soon to close without either the program or the funding really in place, colleges likely face a nightmarish summer trying to keep their students informed on what to expect. The enrollment slippage could be another severe economic setback to the colleges come September. We don't, of course, mean to belabor the point because we are fully aware of your own deep concern on this issue.

We are equally concerned over the fact that no regulations are forthcoming for title X. Higher education and the States would benefit enormously if such regulations were already published.

Some States are going ahead to organize their 1202 commissions, with or without Federal help. They are guided by the simple fact that title X is the law of the land.

If cost-effectiveness and accountability are what Congress and the administration want from higher education these days, and this obviously is the case, then the States ought to be encouraged to do more in planning and coordination.