COLUMBUS — After absorbing severe budget cuts over the last two years, the state's public colleges and universities are asking for $765 million more the next time around, money that would be used to improve academics, access and aid.

        The Ohio Board of Regents on Thursday recommended the state spend $2.7 billion in the fiscal year beginning July 1 and nearly $3 billion the following year, 10 percent increases in each year. The state is spending $2.5 billion on higher education this year.

        “This is extremely optimistic, but it's not extravagant by virtue of a need,” said Rich Petrick, the regent's vice chancellor for finance. “We lost a lot of basic funding over the last two years and this would restore that.”

        Higher education sustained a $241 million cut this year and last.

        Under the proposal, the state's share of the cost of instruction would increase 11 percent in each of the two years, a total of $536 million. That would take some of the pressure off universities to charge students more in tuition to cover the costs, Mr. Petrick said after the board met at Cuyahoga Community College in Cleveland.

        The recommendations also call for large increases in several student financial aid and scholarship programs. For example, Access Challenge grants, which allow community and technical colleges to freeze tuition, would increase by 10 percent the first year and 5 percent the second, or $15 million over the two years.

        And, the regent's proposal would earmark nearly $6 million more to attract and to keep top-notch faculty and staff.

        Whether higher education will get the increase it's asking for is uncertain, given that the state already faces a potential budget deficit next year because of increased Medicaid spending and slow tax revenues.

        Colleges and universities once again will compete with primary and secondary education for funding. Susan Tave Zelman, state schools superintendent, has recommended to the 19-member state school board that $3 billion more should be spent on schools over the two years.

        The regents' budget request contrasts with what they sought and ultimately received in the current two-year budget, where the priority was funding primary and secondary education to high levels to satisfy Ohio Supreme Court rulings that said the way the state paid for schools was unconstitutional.

        In spring 2001, the regents had asked for two 13 percent increases, which included a one-time $300 million infusion over two years for the Ohio Plan, an ambitious research and technology plan to spark Ohio's economy. Money for that program was scrapped in the final budget signed into law.

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