Millions of Pennsylvanians have a stake in the outcome of the negotiations over the 2012-13 state budget. Colleges, public schools and human service programs face cuts under Gov. Tom Corbett’s spending plan. Lawmakers, even some of Corbett’s fellow Republicans, say some cuts go too far. This sets up heated negotiations in the coming weeks.

The state House of Representatives probably will accept, to one degree or another, the Senate's plan to restore the higher education funding that was cut under Gov. Tom Corbett's proposed budget, House Speaker Sam Smith told IUP trustees on Thursday.

You did it. You did it after a lot of hard work. You believed in yourself and you did it," said retired Major General Donna Barbisch as she began her address to California University of Pennsylvania graduating seniors. "Commencement is just the beginning. Tomorrow, your adventure begins. As California University graduates, you have the foundation. Dream big."

The applause was fierce as the commencement speaker for Cheyney University of Pennsylvania was announced, but it was counteracted by the punctuated echoing chants between the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the graduates sitting before him.

More than 400 new college graduates walked across the stage at Decker Gymnasium Saturday, and into their futures as Mansfield University held its 147th commencement. As is tradition, the ceremony was held the day before Mother's Day, and many of the smiling graduates wore "Thanks Mom" on their mortarboards for all to see.

Michael Brune recalled Saturday that in May 1993, as he sat in Farrell Stadium about to receive dual degrees in economics and finance, he decided he didn’t know what he wanted to do. “I was sitting where you are right now,” he told the 2012 graduating class of West Chester University. He said he hit the road, saw the country, came back to West Chester and put in a resume with the environmental group Greenpeace in Philadelphia. He got the job, liked it and started his career as an environmental activist.

Steve Keefer says just being around his son Brian’s smiling optimism puts him in a good mood. That’s one reason Steve, 57, was willing to retire from his job at the Defense Distribution Center Susquehanna and move into a dorm room at Lock Haven University for two years to be Brian’s caretaker. His family’s sacrifices were worth it, he said — Brian graduates today.

A new generation of potential female scientists, engineers and mathematicians descended Friday on Shippensburg University in the school’s first Exploring Science, Technology, Engineering, Earth Science and Mathematics conference.

Students may be gone for the summer, but Shippensburg University will not be desolate. Throughout the almost four-month break from the regular academic year, people of all ages, sizes and interests will gain something from SU; from better football-throwing or basketball-dribbling talent to forensic investigation or mathematics computation skills, and even life-long friends and mentors or the experience of being them. Starting in June, youth ages 6-18 will either commute to SU or move in to the campus' residence halls for a few days at a time as they participate in an array of summer camps.

The long goodbye has begun for Indiana University of Pennsylvania Interim President David Werner. During IUP's final trustees' meeting for the year, Chairman David Osikowicz commended Werner for the job he has done in the two years he has been with IUP, saying Werner has changed its culture and attitude for the better.

Indiana University of Pennsylvania officials are preparing to advance the long-delayed hotel project for the Kovalchick Convention and Athletic Complex. The turning point is to come by June 1, when officials will have determined how they will set up the land development deal paving the way for the hotel.

A grant from the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation will support training teachers at California University of Pennsylvania this summer. The $178,000 grant, delivered over two years, will allow secondary teachers from Eastern Westmoreland and Western Area Career and Technology Centers to take part in the certification program.

In 2005, years before California University of Pennsylvania broke ground on its $59 million convocation center, a consultant hired by the school suggested the center's planned arena was too big for the local events market. It said an arena half the size -- one with 3,500 seats -- would be a better fit. But CalU wanted a space indoors that would be big enough for commencements, so it decided on an arena capable of holding 6,000 people, an indoor venue it said would be the largest between Pittsburgh and Morgantown, W.Va.

The fallout from Gov. Tom Corbett's budget cuts to education just keeps falling.

A recent consequence of squeezing higher education funding in particular comes with the University of Pittsburgh's decision to suspend admission to graduate programs in its classics, religious studies and German departments.

College graduates encountering today's tough job market often wish they could hit the rewind button, a new study from Rutgers University finds.

A college degree once equaled a ticket to a good job and upward path.  But in these post-recession times, it’s often a ticket to no job or a bad one. A new Rutgers University study looked at people who graduated from college since 2006 and found only 51 percent had a full-time job.

Kelsey Griffith graduates on Sunday from Ohio Northern University. To start paying off her $120,000 in student debt, she is already working two restaurant jobs and will soon give up her apartment here to live with her parents. Her mother, who co-signed on the loans, is taking out a life insurance policy on her daughter.

In a wood-paneled office lined with books, sports memorabilia and framed posters (including John Belushi in “Animal House”), E. Gordon Gee, the president of Ohio State University, keeps a framed quotation that reads, “If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”

In exchange for maintaining state aid to several of the state's largest universities, Senate Appropriations Chairman Jake Corman wanted a promise in return. The Centre County Republican told the schools that they'd need to keep any tuition increases for next year low, no higher than the consumer price index, in order for lawmakers to agree to reverse the governor's proposed cuts.

The Senate on Wednesday advanced a state budget that restores some funding to school districts, higher education and human services as lawmakers struck a deal to limit tuition hikes at public universities.

So many students will graduate from Slippery Rock University this spring that administrators have had to limit the number of guests each one can invite. There isn't enough room in the basketball arena for everybody. At a time when American higher education is under fire for dismal graduation rates that have eroded the nation's leadership in college degree-holders, this public university in western Pennsylvania will graduate a record number of students, and do so more quickly than in years past.

A grant from the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation will support training for secondary and post-secondary teachers when California University of Pennsylvania hosts a Siemens Mechatronic Systems Instructor Certification Program this summer.

Pennsylvania college students are urging federal lawmakers to strike a deal to avert a spike in student loan interest rates, saying higher education is already expensive enough.

Calculations involving financial aid, student loans and potential future earnings as a public-sector accountant nearly led Nick Costa to community college four years ago. Instead, he graduated on Saturday from Duquesne University with no regrets but with $38,500 in public and private loans, including $18,500 in subsidized federal loans with interest rates of 3.4 percent. Legislation providing for the subsidized loans expires in July, bringing rates to 6.8 percent unless Congress reauthorizes the 2007 law. Congress wants to keep interest rates from spiking but can't agree on how to raise the $6 billion needed to maintain the subsidized rate.

In the Crawford County community of Titusville, population 5,601, Mayor Esther Smith called the news "devastating" and a threat to efforts to stem population loss in and around her city. Others expressed worry that the announcement may portend lost educational opportunity in rural parts of Pennsylvania, a state where sharp funding cuts to public higher education have become practically the norm.

The Issue: Tuition differentials raise millions of dollars for colleges and universities. Our Opinion: A higher education is expensive enough without the additional burden.

No state has seen a larger percentage tuition increase in the past few years than Arizona, which nearly doubled its average rates at public universities between 2007 and 2011. But four straight years of double-digit increases are coming to an end in 2012, at least for the state’s two largest universities, with a freeze on tuition and fees next fall at the University of Arizona and Arizona State.

In what is shaping up as an academic Battle of the Titans — one that offers vast new learning opportunities for students around the world — Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on Wednesday announced a new nonprofit partnership, known as edX, to offer free online courses from both universities.

Diversity and accessibility were two central points in Dr. Michael Fiorentino, Jr.'s inauguration speech at Lock Haven University as the university's 14th president yesterday. He emphasized diversity as strength.

During the 2011-12 academic year, Clarion University-Venango Campus has celebrated 50 years of growth and community partnerships. As the campus embarks on its next 50 years, it will do so with a new moniker – Venango College of Clarion University of Pennsylvania.