A state panel formulating a new framework for higher education in Pennsylvania will hear from more than a dozen stakeholders today, including a community college student, the provost of a small Catholic university and the chairman of a veterans program.
 
The governor's Advisory Commission for Postsecondary Education is holding its fourth public meeting today in Philadelphia.
 
Chairman Rob Wonderling calls it a "listening" session that will help form policy recommendations aimed at allowing Pennsylvanians to focus on lifelong learning, not annual angst over tuition and state funding. About 816,000 state residents were enrolled in some type of postsecondary institution as of fall 2010, according to the commission.
 
Governor Tom Corbett created the panel in February after proposing a budget that would cut aid to state universities by 20-percent to 30-percent next year. The commission's final report is due to the governor by November 15th.