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Maryland university tuition going up 6perc 2005 { January 27 2005 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39818-2005Jan26.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A39818-2005Jan26.html
Tuition in Maryland To Rise 5.8% in Fall
Regents Reject Cap on Future Increases
By Amit R. Paley
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, January 27, 2005; Page B01
The Board of Regents of the University System of Maryland voted yesterday to raise in-state undergraduate tuition by 5.8 percent in the fall and rejected a plan to cap future increases.
The cap proposal, defeated 13 to 3, would have limited annual increases to 5 percent during the next three years. Proponents said the measure was necessary because tuition has gone up nearly 40 percent since 2002, turning Maryland's public university system into one of the 10 most expensive in the nation.
"Tuition increases on this campus are totally out of control," said James C. Rosapepe, the regent who sponsored the tuition-cap plan. "We are going to lose a lot of students who just can't afford these increases."
Compared with double-digit increases over the past few years, however, the tuition increase approved yesterday is relatively modest. Between fall 2002 and fall 2003, for example, tuition jumped 17.5 percent.
Chancellor William E. Kirwan said the university system originally considered tuition increases of up to 12 percent next year on some campuses. But he said those figures were lowered after Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) announced a 4.8 percent increase -- about $43 million -- in state funding to the university system this month.
Kirwan said the $798 million in state aid next year would allow the University System of Maryland to rebuild after several years of budget cuts.
"We think this is a breakthrough," he said. "We feel this is a good starting point in the reinvestment in higher education."
Kirwan and other higher education leaders noted that the university system still receives less funding than it did before 2002. The $865 million in state aid for that fiscal year fell to $746 million last fiscal year as Ehrlich and legislators struggled to deal with a large budget deficit.
"The problem is not over," said C.D. Mote Jr., president of the university's flagship College Park campus. "This is basically a holding pattern; it's not a recovery plan."
Based on yesterday's vote, tuition and fees for in-state undergraduates at the College Park campus will rise from $7,410 this year to $7,821 in the fall. In fall 2001, it cost in-state undergraduates $5,341 to attend the school.
University of Virginia in-state tuition and fees this year are $6,790.
Kirwan said the solution to Maryland's persistent budget problems is to rework the funding formula. Unlike primary education or community colleges, he said, the university system is not guaranteed funding based on its enrollment.
The lack of guaranteed funding could become a greater problem as student enrollment continues to grow, Kirwan said. By 2012, enrollment is projected to balloon by about 30 percent. There were 34,933 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled in the system's 11 campuses at the start of this academic year. "I do think that we need a new kind of funding model that will fund us on a per-student basis," Kirwan said. "Without that kind of guarantee, our planning capabilities are greatly hampered."
The tuition-cap plan proposed by Rosapepe would have asked the governor to allocate funding based on a per-student formula that would have provided at least an additional $50 million to the university system in future years. It would have also asked Ehrlich to add about $2.7 million to next year's budget.
Several regents said they voted against the proposal because they feared the political ramifications of asking Ehrlich for more money.
"To go back to the governor and say, 'You didn't give us enough,' that would be a huge mistake," said regent Marvin Mandel, a former governor who voted against the cap. "You all will be running around Annapolis like you're crazy."
Jeremy T. Horine, a junior at Towson University and student regent who supported the cap, said the rising tuition costs have thrust him and his friends into debt. He said the need to pay off student loans could limit his future career options.
He also said that the high costs precluded some prospective students from coming to the university: "You're not offering higher education to everyone. You're only offering it to people who can afford it."
Rosapepe's proposal mirrored a bill approved by the General Assembly last year that would have limited tuition increases to 5 percent and raised the corporate tax rate to provide a dedicated source of funding for the university system.
Ehrlich said the tax increase was unnecessary and vetoed the bill. Some Democratic lawmakers said they hoped to override the veto, but the effort dissolved after Ehrlich announced the funding increase this month.
© 2005 The Washington Post Company
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