Going up — 04/12/08

Sat, May 17 2008

— With the approval of a biennium budget that reduces state funding to state universities and community and technical colleges by 3 percent on top of 3 percent cuts already imposed for this fiscal year, the University of Kentucky is on the verge of doing the expected: Approving a hefty increase in tuition. Again.
Expect other universities and community and technical colleges to do that same.
UK is proposing a 9 percent hike in tuition for the second year in a row. While that is lower than the annual double-digit increases imposed during the early years of this decade, it still will make it that much more difficult for students from families of modest means to attend the state’s flagship university. Most likely will choose to go deeper into debt to pay for their college education and, thereby, begin their post-college careers tens of thousands of dollars in debt.
In a related move, UK President Lee T. Todd also announced that UK faculty and staff will not be receiving raises this fall. That could cause some outstanding professors to depart Lexington for greener pastures in other states, but the fact that universities in dozens of other states are facing similar cuts may ease the attrition. One can only hope.
With UK losing $20 million in state funding, Todd said the university has little choice but to raise more money on the backs of students and their parents.
Todd said it would take an 18 percent jump in tuition and mandatory fees to cover the entire reduction in state money. But he called the recommended higher rates the “smallest increase we can afford without severely compromising quality.”
Thus, a trend that began in the late 1990s continues: More and more of the cost of a higher education is being shifted from taxpayers to students. Some legislators actually support this, calling tuition “user fees.” But in a state that critically needs to dramatically increase its number of college graduates, making it ever more difficult for students to afford a college education could have a long-lasting negative impact on Kentucky’s economy.