In an era when education - from preschools to post-doctoral programs - are in fierce competition for tax dollars, we'd like to see the state of South Dakota find the money to fund a proposed building for the Higher Education Center West River.

The South Dakota Board of Regents, via HB1251, asked the state Legislature for the bonding authority to build a $15.4 million education center on 12 acres of donated land in Rapid City. The new facility would replace a patchwork of borrowed space all over Rapid City that currently serves as classrooms for off-campus college courses offered here by Black Hills State University, South Dakota State University, the University of South Dakota, Dakota State University and Northern State University. Until two years ago, most of those course offerings were housed at Ellsworth Air Force Base's education center. A new Air Force financial center took over that space last year, and forced the Higher Education Center West River to split among nine sites in Rapid City.

About 1,700 people currently take advantage of those classes in Rapid City, but the lack of a centralized location makes it inconvenient, inefficient and virtually impossible for a student to take more than one class per evening.

The state funded a similar center in Sioux Falls, where some 3,600 students take off-campus courses from various state universities. We think it is time that non-traditional students in western South Dakota be given the same consideration. Older college students are an important piece of the higher education puzzle in South Dakota, and one of the biggest reasons that our universities are flourishing at a time when the state is losing ground in the high school-age demographic. South Dakota has fewer and fewer high school graduates, but its college enrollments rose 4 percent in 2007.

Anything the state can do to encourage the enrollment of older, non-traditional, working students, and increase their graduation rates, is a good thing. A better-educated workforce is an investment in economic development in South Dakota.

A higher education center, especially one built on conveniently located donated land, would be money well spent by South Dakota taxpayers.