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Two public colleges to lower nonresident tuition

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by Carolyn Potts

Monday, March 10, 2008

Some public universities across the country will begin to lower their tuition for out-of-state students in fall 2008, though University of Wisconsin students will not see decreasing tuition costs anytime soon.

Schools including the University of Nebraska-Omaha and California State University-East Bay are trying to increase diversity and increase the number of students on their campuses by lowering the tuition for nonresident students from neighboring states.

The UW System has already taken measures to increase the number of nonresident students in their colleges by lowering out-of-state tuition for all the campuses in the UW System in 2006 — expect for UW-Madison.

Board of Regents Vice President Chuck Pruitt said this measure was because UW schools had been priced out of the competitive market and were unable to draw enough nonresident students.

The regents voted to lower the average out-of-state tuition of $14,300 at these schools by $2,000 per year, and Pruitt said the regents felt this was necessary to stay competitive with other schools in their peer groups.

“We lost a significant number of students who would go to UW-Oshkosh, UW-Green Bay, UW-La Crosse, all of these schools,” Pruitt said. “We took a hard look and recognized that an out-of-state student more than pays for the cost of their education … and adjusted the tuition.”

UW professor of education administration Jacob Stampen said the reason universities have begun to lower tuition prices is the university loses revenue if it loses out-of-state students.

The regents did not lower the tuition at UW-Madison because there is no lack of out-of-state applicants, Pruitt said.

Stampen said the trigger for the recent decreases in tuition in public and private universities around the country is the debate over the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, a federal act intended to strengthen the resources of colleges and universities and provide financial aid to students. He said there has been a lot of criticism over the raising of tuition, especially at some private universities that don’t need the money.

Stampen said institutions continue to raise tuition, which in turn makes financial aid offered by the government to students less effective, adding Congress is also criticizing banks for not doing anything about the loan system.

“[The state is] supposed to invest enough in their colleges so that the school doesn’t need to raise their tuition,” Stampen said.

According to UW System spokesperson David Giroux, there were and still are some political sensitivities when the Board of Regents voted to cut the cost of nonresident tuition.

Giroux said people are concerned that, by offering nonresidents a reduced tuition price, the university would be bringing in more nonresident students that would take the place of resident students.

Giroux said this is not the case, however, because the UW System has a self-imposed out-of-state student cap that says that no more than 25 percent of undergraduates can be nonresidents. He also said nonresident students subsidize in-state students because they “more than pay for the cost of their education.”

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