Regent majority supports freezing tuition

IOWA CITY - A majority of the nine members of the Board of Regents have expressed support for an unprecedented third straight tuition freeze for resident undergraduates in Iowa - one day after the board held its first discussion of a proposed 1.75 percent tuition increase for the 2015-16 school year.

Three regents - Larry McKibben, Ruth Harkin, and President Bruce Rastetter - publicly expressed support for a tuition freeze during their board meeting on the University of Iowa campus Thursday. Regents Milt Dakovich and Hannah Walsh told The Gazette on Friday that they too would support a freeze as long as the board gets support from the legislature.

'I am very much in favor of the tuition freeze,” Walsh said in an email, adding that the regents must work toward striking a balance between providing students with a high-quality education at an affordable cost.

'As long as the necessary legislative funds are appropriated to maintain this high quality,” I am all for the freeze,” Walsh said.

The board in September agreed to ask lawmakers for a 1.75 percent inflationary increase in appropriations for the next school year, along with an additional $12.9 million to help roll out new performance- and enrollment-based funding metrics.

Last week, the Board of Regents Office made public a proposal to increase tuition by 1.75 percent for undergraduate Iowans - after freezing it for two years in a row. But three regents on Thursday said an efficiency review underway on its university campuses that could save tens of millions of dollars has them considering another freeze.

'What I want to say to everyone who is listening and everyone who is here, is that I will offer a motion on Dec. 3 to freeze tuition for an unprecedented third year in a row,” said McKibben, who is heading the efficiency review for the Board of Regents.

McKibben said savings from the efficiency review, which have been projected at between $30 million and $80 million a year, will help make another tuition freeze possible.

'The universities already are moving on projects,” McKibben said Thursday. 'That is not money we are going to take back. We are going to repurpose it at the universities.”

The original proposal to increase tuition in the next school year included similar increases for out-of-state, graduate and professional students, who have not seen tuition freezes in recent years. Harkin, in seconding McKibben's support for a third freeze for undergraduate Iowans, suggested the board also look at freezing rates for non-residents and those at the graduate and professional level.

And Walsh told The Gazette on Friday that she supports that possibility too.

'Our out-of-state students better each of our regent universities, bringing income into the state and diversity of opinion,” she said. 'It is time to explore how we can work to reduce their debt levels as well.”

Dakovich told The Gazette that he too supports freezing tuition for undergraduate residents and wants to look at doing so for all students - as long as the Legislature comes through with the requested funding. He said savings from the efficiency review could play a role in making that happen.

'There are things and parts of the efficiency study … that the institutions are already embarking on,” Dakovich said. 'Some will take some time to recognize any savings. But there are some quick and easy things they can do now.”

Regent Bob Downer on Thursday shared some of the concerns McKibben and Harkin expressed about increasing tuition, but he focused his comments on concerns around mounting student fees.

The board will finalize and take action on its tuition proposal at its December meeting.