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Last fall, more than 185,000 students started or returned to one of Illinois’ 12 public universities focused on earning what continues to be a game-changer for families, communities and ultimately the state as a whole.

On average, having a bachelor’s degree in Illinois doubles an individual’s earning potential — increasing what they contribute to their family and the local economy. College-degree holders enjoy a stronger quality of life, with higher degree attainment associated with improved physical health, life expectancy and civic engagement. And the benefits of a college degree extend beyond the earner, increasing a family’s generational wealth and reducing the likelihood that children grow up in poverty or experience hunger.

Therefore, it cannot be emphasized enough that Illinois’ students arriving on public university campuses across the state is reason for celebration. This past fall, the University of Illinois system announced its largest first-year student class yet. What’s more, Southern Illinois University Carbondale is experiencing its highest enrollment jump in 33 years, having grown by nearly 4 percent from the previous year.

On the other side of these examples, however, is the worrying trend threaded below. Compared with the landscape from 10 years ago, enrollment at our public four-year institutions is down by as much as 20 percent, according to the Illinois State Board of Higher Education. And two decades of declining state funding has not helped, playing a significant role in the financial woes that institutions are facing.

This January, Western Illinois University announced it would be launching a furlough program, its latest effort to address a budget crisis. In other parts of the state, public universities including Northern Illinois University and SIUC are reckoning with budget concerns as well.

The impact of the state’s ongoing status-quo approach of inequitably and inadequately funding our public universities has been slow burning for more than two decades. Regrettably, it is our students who have been shouldering the cost of that shortcoming by shelling out more money to attend school at great personal or familial expense, or by sitting out the college opportunity altogether to avoid the debt they’d have to incur to attend.

However, things do not have to be this way. Frankly, our state cannot afford to continue down a path that has fueled disparities in who earns a college degree and who does not, between who can access the benefits of that degree, versus who cannot.

It is this reality that drove the work of the Commission on Equitable Public University Funding, which was charged in 2021 with studying and identifying an equity-centered funding model for Illinois’ 12 public universities. After more than two years of research, analysis and discussion, the group of agency officials, institutional presidents, technical experts, nonprofit leaders and community partners released its recommendations for an approach to funding institutions that is based in adequacy and positioned to achieve greater equity.

The formula the commission proposed considers what a university needs to serve the diverse students it enrolls based on its mission and the cost of evidence-based programs that support student success. It then identifies what each university can afford to spend — based on current state appropriations, an estimate of tuition and fees that a university can and should collect from its students, and other resources available to them.

The difference between what each university should be spending, and its available resources represents how far each institution is from full funding — its “adequacy gap.”

With an understanding of this gap, the state can then prioritize how best to distribute new funds to make sure new state dollars are directed most heavily to the institutions and students furthest from full funding.

This groundbreaking formula provides the contours for HB1581, which we filed at the start of this legislative session. If adopted, it puts Illinois on a path to bring all its public universities to full funding in the next 10 to 15 years, and to enable more than 29,000 additional Illinoisans to earn a college degree.

If adopted and funded, this new formula, the first of its kind in the country, offers a significant reimagining of how Illinois has approached supporting higher education and university students.

This legislative session, Illinois has the opportunity to transform the way in which it supports its college students to success. Now is the time to ensure our public universities have the resources they need to support thousands more students in the many autumns ahead — whether for the first time to begin this important journey to a degree, or back again to ensure its completion.

State Rep. Carol Ammons, D-Urbana, represents the 103rd District. State Sen. Kimberly A. Lightford, D-Maywood, is the Senate Majority Leader for the Illinois General Assembly and represents the 4th District.