0.cached.png
By Newsweek Editors
0
Share
Newsweek is a Trust Project member
See more of our trusted coverage when you search.Prefer Newsweek on Googleto see more of our trusted coverage when you search.
In July 2002, just one month before she was to start her sophomore year at Penn State, Midori Valdivia received a shocking piece of mail: the bursar's bill. Her tuition had increased 14 percent, to $4,004 per semester. Though she'd heard talk of tuition hikes, she says she "didn't understand how serious it was until I got the bill." She got through, thanks to scholarships and a part-time job (her parents couldn't afford to help). But some of her friends weren't as lucky, including one who withdrew to work at a food-packing plant for a year. Valdivia, 20, thought that the increase would tide the university over for a few years, but she's now worried again. "I pay so much," says Valdivia, directing her frustration at university administrators. "What do they do with their money?"
She's not the only one to ask. Across the country, universities--both public and private--are straining to make ends meet. Facing fiscal crises, states increased spending on higher education by only 1.2 percent on average in 2002-03--the smallest rise in a decade, according to the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education. --Appropriations fell in 14 states, most precipitously (11 percent) in Oregon. In response, public universities raised tuition, fees, and room and board an average of 7.5 percent, to $9,663, according to the College Board. The trustees of the State University of New York voted to increase tuition by $950, to $4,350 per year, or 28 percent over 2002-03. At private schools, where endowments have shrunk and donations are down, tuition and fees rose an average of 5.8 percent, to $18,273, in 2002-03. These prices are "pouring cold water on the aspirations of a lot of people," says National Center president Patrick Callan.
Read More on News
Even as budgets are being squeezed, costs are escalating. To compete in cutting-edge science and technology fields, for instance, universities are shelling out millions for research facilities. But because administrators can be more concerned about raising a college's profile than streamlining operations, says Callan, they don't always act the way a private business might--like making all of a campus's divisions negotiate jointly with vendors for lower prices.
How do colleges get away with charging more? "There's no market constraint to keep them from raising tuition," says Ronald Ehrenberg, director of the Cornell Higher Education Research Institute. "People continue to knock on their doors." Unlike previous economic downturns, this one coincides with projected increases in university enrollment, including an infusion of poor, minority and first-generation college students. They stand to lose the most--a reality exacerbated, according to a College Board study, by the trend toward merit- rather than need-based aid, as universities vie for top performers. "This is a much more high-stakes recession," says Callan, because large classes of kids are at risk of being shut out of higher education. That's not good for business, either.
View 0 Comments
Submit Correction
View Editorial & AI Guidelines