Massachusetts. Board of Regents of Higher Education

In 1980 public higher education in Massachusetts was reorganized. The Executive Office of Educational Affairs and agencies grouped under it with responsibility for higher education--the Board of Higher Education, the Board of Trustees of State Colleges, the Massachusetts Board of Regional Community Colleges, and the separate boards of trustees of the University of Massachusetts, Southeastern Massachusetts University, and the University of Lowell--were abolished and their functions and powers transferred to the newly created Board of Regents of Higher Education (St 1980, c 329, s 112). It was felt that centralized control would help the state better to manage public higher education in a time of declining appropriations and would at the same time improve the governance structure by eliminating competing statutory authority among the existing agencies. In addition to creating a central board, the legislation provided for each institution to have a board of trustees comprised of nine members appointed by the governor. While their powers were to be defined by the regents, it was hoped that the individual boards would help strike a balance between the centralized board and local representation.

Members of the Board of Regents, originally fifteen in number, were appointed by the governor to serve five-year terms. Membership to the board was further defined by St 1983, c 646, which stipulated that at least one of the fifteen members be a representative from organized labor, and by St 1985, c 609, s 1, which increased membership of the board to sixteen to include a full-time undergraduate student from a public institution of higher education.

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