Likins wants $200 tuition hike

By Katie Clark

Arizona Daily Wildcat

UA will never be where it should be in funding, president says

Editor's note: This is the first installment of a three-part series on tuition issues culminating with Thursday's open forum. Tomorrow's story introduces student lobbyists, their role in the hearings and the struggles they face representing UA students. On Thursday, see what regular students can do and what steps the administration is taking to listen.

UA President Peter Likins yesterday recommended a tuition increase of $200 for in-state students, and a $500 hike for out-of-state students, for the next school year.

"We know that there is a critical need for more resources," Likins said, adding that roughly $6 million generated by the proposed increase will go toward information technology, improvements in student advising, graduate teaching-assistant support, financial aid and debt service.

Current in-state tuition for Arizona's three state universities is $2,344, and out-of-state tuition is $9,800, ranking Arizona No. 49 in the country for lowest in-state tuition fees.

"There is really nothing wrong with tuition being low," said Ben Graff, Associated Students for the University of Arizona president.

"The more that tuition rises, the accessibility to institutions (such as UA) decreases," he said.

Kelly Dalton, co-director of Arizona Students Association, a lobbying organization with representives from the three state universities, said an increase is necessary, but not as high as what Likins has recommended.

"I would like to see lower numbers," she said. "But at the same time, these numbers are not excessive."

An Arizona Board of Regents policy mandates tuition stay as close to free as possible.

The Board immediately earmarks nine percent of tuition fees - last year that meant $211 of in-state tuition - went for state financial aid.

Another 27 percent is set aside to pay back debts incurred by the university, and the Regents have the option of reimbursing any portion of that amount to the universities.

Remaining tuition dollars are deposited into a general fund distributed at Likins' discretion.

Unlike years past, Likins has asked for ASA's input on where students want this money spent.

Dalton said ASA's recommendation for tuition increase will be released early next week. She did not comment on specifics of the recommendation, only saying that ASA is still working on it and anticipates student feedback at Thursday's campus forum.

"I would expect that our recommendation would not be as high," she said.

Dalton also reflected on the Regents' decision last year to increase tuition by $85 for in-state students and $389 for out-of-state students.

"The whole process was so stressful," she said. "It was very chaotic, very stressful." She added that she hopes this year's decision will be more organized.

Because the increase was relatively low last year, Dalton said she knew UA was in for a substantial increase this year.

"ASA has know from that day that a much larger increase was coming," she said.

Arizona State University's tuition will see the same increase as UA's, and Northern Arizona University will see an identical in-state increase but only a $400 increase for out-of-state students.

Dalton said the smaller out-of-state increase at NAU is due to a small amount of out-of-state students at the university and because a much larger increase may be proposed next year.

Likins said even with the increase, UA will still be "millions and millions of dollars short of where we should be."

"This is a very, very stressful time for us," he said. "It is very unlikely that the recommendations will be received (by the Regents)."

He added that even if Arizona increased its tuition while every other state stayed the same, it would only move Arizona to No. 47 in tuition fees.

"We're so far behind, now," Likins said. "We're always going to be an underfunded university. We just have to accept that."

Any Student can voice their opinions to the Regents via satellite at the tuition hearing on April 5 at 5 p.m. in Harvill, Room 211.

The final decision will come from the nine voting Regents during ABOR's April 11-12 meeting.

Tuition Forum

The Arizona Daily Wildcat will moderate a forum on the issue of tuition Thursday at 7 p.m. in Harvill, Room 150. Not only can students and others from the UA community participate in an open dialogue on the tuition process and learn where the dollars are going, but students can offer suggestions of where they want their tuition money spent. Panel members include ASUA President Ben Graff; ASA Directors Sam Chang, Kelly Dalton and Ray Quintero; ABOR student Regent Mary Echiverria; ASA Executive Director Paul Peterson and former student Regent Christine Thompson.

Tuition increase