For nearly six hours, Utah Board of Higher Education leaders deliberated and debated over every detail of the requests from each of the state’s eight public colleges and universities. In the end, they approved small increases for all, adding to an overall tuition and fee bump of 2.23% for the system — an amount lower than last year and lower than the annual inflation rate.
“That’s not accidental but a result of intentional policy and direction,” said Geoff Landward, the commissioner over higher education for the state, at the conclusion of the meeting. “Overall, it’s the students who win in terms of affordability.”
Over the past few years, Utah’s political leaders have grown increasingly concerned about the growing expenses of higher education, including ballooning administrative costs and how that is passed onto students.
Audits requested by the Legislature in 2018 and 2020 strongly criticized the board — whose members have all since been replaced — for approving tuition proposals without question or analysis, never rejecting a requested hike, and for allowing long lists of unexplained fees to be charged.
Continuing with their crusade against excessive costs, lawmakers this year approved a $60.5 million budget reduction for the state’s public colleges and universities to push them to rein in spending and reallocate money to more efficient programs that graduate students at higher rates and lead to higher-paying jobs.
And that cut came with a warning from the Legislature: Schools could not raise tuition to try to offset the losses. They need to learn how to operate with less.
Landward said all of that has prompted the board to be more careful when appraising requests for tuition increases, which also included milder increases last year, for a total of 3.1%, and marked the first time the board ever reduced the proposed increase for any school.
This year followed that pattern with small cuts to three institutions’ requests: Salt Lake Community College, Utah Tech University and Utah State University.
Read the full report at sltrib.com.
This article is published through the Utah News Collaborative, a partnership of news organizations in Utah that aims to inform readers across the state.