UMass official: Proposed state budget is $17 million short to freeze tuition and fees - Diane Lederman, The Republican

Calling education the state’s equivalent to the Texas oil industry and worthy of investment, Higher Education Commissioner Richard M. Freeland implored legislators on Tuesday to continue their support for increased funding for higher education. Freeland was one of several education officials who addressed more than a dozen members of the House and Senate Joint Committee on Ways and Means at a fiscal 2015 budget hearing on education at the University of Massachusetts. Budget hearings are being held around the state, and the one at the system’s flagship university addressed education. http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2014/02/education_officials_solicit_bu.html