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JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) — Missouri senators are considering a measure to impose tough attendance requirements for students receiving state-sponsored scholarships.

Sponsoring Republican Sen. David Pearce, of Warrensburg, says the bill is designed to help students finish their degrees on time. It would require them to take a defined number of credit hours per semester to remain eligible for aid.

The Bright Flight, Access Missouri and the A+ Schools Program would be affected.

The measure has already won first-round approval and is expected to be sent to the House this week.

COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) — Missouri coach Gary Pinkel is providing few clues as to who's winning the competition to start at quarterback this fall.

Returning starter James Franklin began spring camp March 12th listed atop the depth chart, but Corbin Berkstresser and Maty Mauk have also taken snaps with the top offense ahead of Saturday's Black and Gold game.

Pinkel says he's in no rush to make a decision.

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) - Veterans moving to Missouri after leaving the military could immediately claim in-state tuition for public higher education under a bill passed by the state House.

 

The House voted 152-0 to send the measure to the Senate Thursday.

 

It would allow veterans to immediately claim the discounted tuition rate despite not having lived in the state previously. Typically, students seeking in-state tuition must reside in Missouri for 12 consecutive months before qualifying.

 

The measure is sponsored by Republican Rep. Charlie Davis, of Webb City. It also includes a provision that prevents university instructors from giving exams to National Guard members less than 24 hours after they return from training.

URBANA, Ill. (AP) - Students applying to get into the University of Illinois' Urbana-Champaign campus will be able to apply online next year. But they won't be using an online process that allows students to apply to many colleges with one application.

The News-Gazette in Champaign reports that the university is developing its own online application for the Urbana-Champaign and Springfield campuses. Students applying to the Chicago campus can already use the Common Application Consortium that also covers more than 450 schools.

A university committee has decided that the $500,000 annual cost of the Common Application Consortium to the university's flagship campus outweighed its benefits. The university says an in-house system will cost about $50,000 a year.

The Springfield campus has an online application system. It also doesn't use the Common Application Consortium.

MARYVILLE, Mo. (AP) - Northwest Missouri State says it plans to close what is commonly known as its Home Economics department after the spring semester.

The university says the Department of Family & Consumer Sciences department is the victim of budget cuts. The department has been an academic division at the university in Maryville since 1908, although the name changed several times.

Courses teaching skills such as merchandising, child and family studies, nutrition and diet will be taught in other departments.

The Maryville Daily Forum reports (http://bit.ly/13IBK9e ) only three of the six full-time staff members and one part-time employee will remain after this year.

Child and family studies is being downgraded to a minor, while merchandising will no longer be a degree program.

A banquet celebrating the department will be held next Tuesday.