CSU Board of Trustees raises tuition fees

Fees • State Univerity Fees raised by eight percent for undergraduate students and by 10 percent for all other graduate students.

By Carlos Munguia
Online Forty-Niner
Contributing Writer

On Thursday, Oct. 28, the Board of Trustees met at the Chancellors Office to approve the proposed 2005-06 Support Budget. The budget and fee increases were adopted on a 15 – 3 vote and will be effective for fall 2005.

Those in opposition to the votes were Lieutenant Governor Cruz Bustamante, Trustee Ricardo F. Icaza, and Student Trustee Eric Guerra. During the meeting, Bustamante said that it seemed that the "families and students" will carry the full burden of the increases.

The enrollment growth funding will reverse a trend of two years of enrollment reductions that resulted from significant General Fund budget cuts. In addition, the budget will provide a three percent increase for general operations, funding nearly $137.8 million in mandatory costs, conpensation, and long-term needs that have not been funded over the past three years.

"It is educational genocide," said Patricia McTaggart, a student at CSU Los Angeles, during her address to the Board of Trustees. "Education is being put in the hands of the privileged."

In accord with the compact, the budget also recommends an eight percent State University Fee increase for undergraduate students and graduate students pursuing a teaching credential, and a 10 percent increase for all other graduate students.

"Generations are being condemned to no education to save California," said Susana Morales, student at CSULA.

The California State Student Association President Manolo Platin urged the board to adopt a budget without student fee increases. "Fee increases reduce affordability for students and threaten the economic prosperity of California," he said.

"Raising fees is a very difficult decision for all of us. This is one of many actions we are forced to take as a result of the budget cuts experienced over the previous three years," said Murray L. Galison, chairman of the Board of Trustees. "I strongly suggest that we all work together, faculty, students, trustees and the administration, to show the governor and the legislators that the needs of the CSU system are much greater than this budget reflects."

Based on the higher education compact, the proposed 2005-06 CSU budget requests $224.8 million in new revenue for the CSU. The new revenue includes funding for a 2.5 percent increase in student enrollment — $63.7 million – which would allow the CSU to serve an additional 10,000 students (8,103 full-time equivalent students). This enrollment growth funding will reverse a trend of two years of lowered enrollment and budget cuts.

"Fees are making education an impossible dream to many CSU students," said Lillian Taiz, California Faculty Association (CFA) president. Taiz continued during her address by expressing that fee increases are "aggressive in demanding more of students."

The budget sets aside $23.3 million for student financial aid, which brings the State University Grant funding to $223 million, and supports 101,200 state grants. This funding will allow the CSU to provide financial aid to cover the student fee increases for its most needy students, and increase by 2,700 the grants from the previous year.

"Over the next several months we will be working with the governor, his administration, and legislative leader to make the case for the CSU, and ensure that the university receives its fair share of state resources," said CSU Chancellor Charles B. Reed. "We hope these conversations result in actions that recapture the promise of California's master plan for higher education."