UCA students could be looking at a proposed 4% increase in tuition fees in the coming 2024-2025 school year.
The increase, which the UCA Board of Trustees has not yet approved, is in response to declining student credit hours, growing inflation and loss of state funding.
UCA President Houston Davis stressed that raising tuition is not something taken lightly by the administration.
“The biggest thing for students, that I want them to know, is that we are aware of the tension where we have to be respectful of the fact that our students can only bear so much in terms of tuition increases, but we also have very real costs — principally, personnel. That is 75% of our budget. So, there’s an incredible tension there, and I want students to know that we spend a lot of time making certain that we put a name and a function to every one of those dollars,” Davis said.
Trustees have already approved a 5% increase in room and board fees for the 2024-25 school year.
“That 4% [tuition increase] that we’re modeling, that’s not official yet at all. I mean that’s just what we’re modeling for consideration for the board. But we are looking at something that’s in that ballpark.
“Our room and board went up by, I think, 5.5% respectively, and we wanted it to be inside of that. So we do not want to be that high with general tuition,” Davis said.
Discussion on the proposed increase along with a variety of the university’s goals in the coming years was brought up at the Campus Talk hosted March 14, with Davis detailing what the Resource Optimization Initiative is and how it benefits UCA.
Universities across the country are dealing with budgeting issues, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, with UCA being ahead of the curve since implementing the Resource Optimization Initiative in 2018.
“ROI is important to ensure that UCA remains a choice university and positioned to fulfill our mission and thrive during an era of uncertainty for public and private universities and colleges,” Davis said, referencing the slideshow presented in the meeting.
A goal going forward will be raising the floor pay of university employees from $27,040 to around $29,120. This will be the second annual floor pay increase, with some employees getting a 15% pay increase to reach $27,040 in July 2023.
“Our greatest assets are talented faculty and staff, and we must work to retain our talent despite the future challenges in higher education and our enrollment generally,” Davis said.
Faculty and staff retention is a large proponent of the proposed tuition increase, as it allows the university to support them as much as possible, and in return, support student success.
“I hope that our students appreciate the fact that we’ve got great faculty and staff, and we want to make certain that we can retain them, that they are supported by the university to the maximum extent that we can. So generally we talk about modest tuition increases to allow us to maximize what we can do for our faculty and staff, and operations,” Davis said.
If the proposal is passed, it will go into effect July 1 and will raise tuition for summer courses.