Philanthropic support for this program has been fantastic.

These are superb students—all with a GPA higher than 8.0, some with 9.0. That's the very top. They're in a category that's very, very unique.

At first, we were recruiting about 20 per cent of the students we made an offer to. As the funds in the endowment increased, we're now getting over 50 per cent. That's a huge jump in our success rate.

We don't want to support developers to build their private roads.

With this proposed appropriation falling significantly short of the funds requested to support a tuition freeze by Penn State at 20 of its undergraduate campuses, that idea will need to be abandoned. The tuition freeze proposal was approved by Penn State's Board of Trustees during their September, 2005, meeting, dependent on a 9.5 percent increase in state appropriation.

We appreciate the governor's ongoing support for Penn State and understand the pressure on the commonwealth's resources in recent years. At the same time, we will work with members of the House and Senate during the coming months to encourage additional support for the University.