Regents say tuition increase tough decision, but likely needed

IOWA CITY - Regents President David Miles said state regents do not take lightly the decision of asking Iowa students and their families to pay more at the University of Iowa, Iowa State University and the University of Northern Iowa.

But even at the proposed base tuition increase of 5 percent for next year, the three universities still face significant budget cuts, Miles said today during a discussion on the tuition proposal. The three university presidents echoed that sentiment.

“Even at the level proposed, we will ask the universities to do more with less,” Miles, of West Des Moines, said, calling the past two years of state budget reductions “particularly brutal” for the regent universities. “The magnitude of the state budget cuts has made it impossible to hold students harmless.”

The proposal discussed by the regents today during a meeting in Iowa City calls for a 5 percent increase to base tuition for in-state undergraduate students in 2011-12. Tuition and fees combined would increase 4.7 percent at the UI, 7 percent at ISU and 4.9 percent at UNI under the proposal, which will go back to the regents in March for final approval.

Student leaders from the three universities shared their varying views on the proposal. UNI's student senate leader said he reluctantly supports the 5 percent increase as a way to maintain quality, but the UI and ISU undergraduate student government presidents said they could not support the proposal at this time. ISU Government of the Student Body President Luke Roling asked for an increase more in line with the projected Higher Education Price Index, which is 2.2 percent to 4 percent.

“It is a sad day when the student body president has to defend a tuition increase to other students,” Joel Anderson, UNI student senate president, said. “We are now at the point where the cuts will start affecting classrooms. Either way, students in Iowa next year will suffer when it comes to higher education.”

Lyndsay Harshman, president of the UI Executive Council of Graduate and Professional Students, reminded the board to keep graduate students in mind, as well, because their education has trickle-down impact on undergraduate education due to their teaching and other responsibilities. Higher graduate tuition may force some of those young professionals out of Iowa due to large debt loads once they receive their law, medical and dentistry degrees, she said.

Regent Michael Gartner pointed out that while the average base tuition increase is 5 percent and the average tuition and fees increase is 5.5 percent, the proposed increase for students in certain degree programs actually ranges from 11.3 percent to 41.4 percent. Differential tuition for some students in certain programs - nursing and engineering at the UI and business at ISU and UNI - account for the higher average increases, which are not included in the average base tuition increase of 5 percent.

“We talk about a 5 percent increase, but that's extremely misleading,” Gartner, of Des Moines, said. “We're talking about an increase for some people that ranges as high as 40 percent.”

The university presidents said in light of state budget cuts of the past several years and declining state support, the proposed 5 percent increase is necessary to maintain quality. Each 1 percent of tuition increase equals $5.6 million in revenue for the three universities. But Gov. Terry Branstad's proposed budget is a 6 percent reduction for the universities next year, or more than $40 million.

“We're doing everything we can to manage down costs and at the same time not pass that on to students,” UI President Sally Mason said.

The three presidents said even with a 5 percent increase, tuition at the schools would remain among the lowest in their peer groups.