<p>and below are the quotes that I misinterpreted:</p>
<p>"…He acknowledges that some schools – including business – are more expensive to run, but worries that higher prices might push low-income students away from those majors. “Students should be free to choose what they want to study based on their intellectual interest,” he said.</p>
<p>U leaders want to prevent that by using a portion of the increased revenue from the surcharge to feed scholarships…"</p>
<p>Both public and private non-profit colleges have exemptions from local property taxes, so they are subsidized indirectly by state/local governments. Apparently this has caused some controversy in towns that house schools with huge endowments, like Princeton.</p>
<p>In other words, not unlike what some other universities are doing, raising list prices, but adding more financial aid so that only those from the higher income households will pay more.</p>
<p>I work at a public university. Our state’s population is declining. At the current rate, given the percentage of state HS students we typically attract, our enrollment will decline in the next decade.</p>
<p>Our university president has begun discussions about charging in-state tuition rates to out-of-state students. Some of our neighboring states have a lot more HS students than we do.</p>
<p>Some react by complaining how “we’re” subsidizing kids from a different state. However, these out-of-state students will boost our economy. They have to find a place to live, buy food, gas, clothing, etc. And if our enrollment will decline without them, how does that benefit state residents? By having a university in our city, there are lots of cultural events, sports events, employees who have to find a place to live, buy food, gas, clothing, etc.</p>
<p>This coming year they’re starting out with granting in-state tuition to students from bordering states. Currently we have very few out-of-state students.</p>
<p>I’ll play. The UCs are recruiting wealthy OOS’ers to fill the UC coffers. I have long argued that they could raise the same money from wealthy instaters. The math is the same. By keeping tuition ‘low’ at, say Cal and UCLA, UC limits the number of instate students who can attend, by replacing some instaters with wealthy OOS’ers. </p>
<p>So, from a practical matter, some instate students will not be accepted to the flagship(s) that otherwise would have been. I’d be willing to bet that some/many of those students would have paid more to attend the flagship(s) if they were given that option.</p>
<p>I bet the wealthy instaters will argue that they are already contributing enough money through taxes to subsidize the low prices UCs are charging.</p>
<p>In-state versus Out-of-state is indefensible if we think that lower-income, lower-cost states are subsidizing the economies of higher cost (and higher tuition) states. </p>
<p>Think of it this way. Turbo Jr. attends school in Oklahoma in-state which is very inexpensive. Then Jr. moves to Sunnyvale. The economy of California gets to benefit from Jr’s education (salary spent there, taxes paid) but not the schools to educate Jr. and not the roads, parks, etc. For California it’s a no brainer. </p>
<p>This may be a stupid argument but substitute Oklahoma with India, or Elbonia, or China, or any country where higher education is ‘free’. How is that not a subsidy to wherever the young Indians, Chinese, or Elbonians migrate to? </p>
<p>When states were funding serious parts of a university’s budget, I would say sure, IS vs OOS is a big deal. But if a state contributes 10%-20% of the college cost, why would the school charge twice as much for OOS?</p>
<p>It’s like E85 gasoline. Only 15% of it is gasoline, and the rest ethanol, yet huge oil swings result in - you guessed it - huge E85 swings.</p>
<ul>
<li>Provide Merit discounts to OOS students</li>
<li>If enrollment is declining, this should hurt private schools too
which may wind up closing or merging providing more students for
publics</li>
<li>Boston University had a lot of financial problems in the last
century. One of the things that they did in the 1980s and 1990s
was aggressively recruit in Asia. I remember how one of my favorite
Thai restaurants in Cleveland Circle was always packed for lunch
on the weekends and wondered where all of these students were
coming from as I didn’t see the larger asian populations at Boston
College - yet. Why isn’t the president working harder on recruiting?</li>
<li>Invest in programs where there is demand or where there will be
future demand. It sort of means that you have to predict the future
but we all have to do that to some degree to be successful.</li>
<li>State universities should have seen much better enrollments when
the economy went into the tank. Did this happen? If not, why? Were
programs not desirable enough to offset the cost advantage?</li>
</ul>
<p>Demographics are hard to fight but there are university presidents
dealt a tough hand that do a great job increasing enrollments and
the success of their students using good management and leadership.</p>
<p>Student demand may have increased, but capacity may have been cut in response to budget cuts. There seem to already be reports of much greater selectivity at California State University campuses (which tend to have little attraction for out of state and international students, despite their relatively low out of state cost).</p>
<p>There should be higher demand from full-pay (at state rates) students though - seems that it would be better to get more of them to deal with the budget cuts.</p>
<p>Is the California response typical or unusual? Demand at my kids’ public schools has gone way up since the economic downturn.</p>
<p>Enrollment is at an all-time high, actually. Lots of focus on recruiting new students. Expansion of international student recruitment as well.</p>
<p>Things are going very well, especially considering funding has been dropping. But given population trends for our state, they are looking forward and creating strategies for the future.</p>
<p>We have a great school and think students from other states would find it a great place to be if the price was competitive with their in-state options.</p>
<p>Something like the New England Regional Studies Program might be a workable model to promote cross-state higher education while making it easier for OOS students to attend your school.</p>
<p>What is the rate of decline in terms of graduating seniors? We may have a similar problem in our state but it seems that there’s a ton of interest in our state university from OOS students - I’m not really sure why that is. Our state provides very little support for higher ed.</p>
<p>From the state university’s point of view, enrolling an in-state student loses money. So budget cuts effectively reduce capacity if the in-state tuition is not raised to compensate. “Surprise” budget cuts (i.e. those that occur at times other than when budgeting is normally planned and tuition rates are set) may not give the opportunity to raise in-state tuition to compensate. Raising in-state tuition can also be problematic from a political standpoint, and may cause enrolled students to drop out due to financial reasons.</p>
<p>Note that “surprise” budget cuts have occurred; a recent one cause some community colleges to cancel some courses that have already started.</p>
<p>lerkin: no doubt that some would. But I would submit that plenty of wealthy instaters would pony up more cash for the Cal/UCLA degree, particularly if the other options were “lower” UC’s. If wealthy OOS’ers find value in paying $55k per year for a UC education, I gotta believe a state of 35 million would have a few that would find the same.</p>
<p>btw: It is beyond my comprehension that UC Merced costs the same as Cal/UCLA/UCSD…</p>
<p>My observations in MA is that they hold the final cost amounts until the last moment until they know what the state contribution will be. In one of the recent years, they charged more than what they through would be needed with a rebate to come based on state aid amounts to be determined.</p>
<p>I have heard about the funny things that go on with California budgeting and I can imagine how hard it would be to plan in that kind of environment. It seems to me that the parents and students in MA are generally willing or able to absorb the price increases. There are protests but I’d call them tiny in relation to the student population. It’s a transfer of wealth from wealthy families to those with need - those that have true need won’t see their prices go up - those with means could complain publicly but it’s not something that I’ve seen much of.</p>
<p>That is the obvious answer from an economic standpoint. But not from a political standpoint (state universities and state governments always have to pay attention to the politics). The same upper middle class families who complain loudly that taxes are too high will complain loudly that tuition is too high, never seeing or admitting the connection.</p>
<p>Do those families have a point? I understand that marginal rates go up to around ten percent in CA. MA is a high-tax and high-spending state but marginal rates only go up to 5.3%. Maybe the well-off complain less about rising tuition costs when tax rates aren’t so high.</p>
<p>A single person for 2011 gets to the top 9.3% rate at $48,029, having reached $2114.62 in taxes (or 4.4% of the income up to $48,029). A married filing jointly couple for 2011 gets to the top 9.3% rate at $96,056, having reached $4,229.24 in taxes (or 4.4% of the income up to $96,056).</p>
<p>For whatever (presumably political) reason, California personal income tax rates are very progressive, which has effects on both politics and finances.</p>
<p>In the politics aspect, most people in California (lower and middle income) don’t think that their personal income taxes are super high. But upper income people are much more likely to see that.</p>
<p>In the finances aspect, California income tax revenue are very volatile, since the top personal income range can vary greatly from year to year, due to large changes in capital gains and losses (high income people tend to have a larger percentage of their income due to capital gains and losses, compared to middle and lower income people whose income is nearly all wage/salary/tip).</p>
<p>“The usual approach is to increase the sticker price where full-pay students subsidize
financial aid for lower-income families. This is the model that many states are using
to keep college affordable for low-income families. Sure, it’s income redistribution
and colleges are actually proud of it. If you, as a higher income family don’t want
to participate in the transfer of wealth, then don’t have your kids go there. They
do this at my son’s school and are openly proud of it and it doesn’t bother me -
the sticker price is still at a considerable discount to full-pay privates.”</p>
<hr>
<p>This has been the case for high-end privates for many years, the ‘educational redistribution of wealth’, and it no doubt is trickling into the desirable flagship state U’s as well. How? Simply by increasing the percentage of full-pay OOS students, full-pay internationals as well. Give me your tired, your smart kids & full tuition across our borders. </p>
<p>Yes, I know that many universities’ boards of regents have a cap on numbers of OOS students, but that doesn’t mean that the decision can’t be revisited on an annual basis either, when they see the bottom line numbers. Or that you hear about any change that is made. Look for those percentages to creep up on the QT in the coming years across the board.</p>
<p>Here’s what it comes down to, like it or not–the supposed middle class that works like heck to try to send their kids to a good school–the ones that gross $75K-$125K & whose EFC is in the $30K range–get absolutely no breaks except on merit aid & IMO are getting the short end of the stick, have been for years. They are the subsidizers. They are the ones that don’t ask for handouts. They are the ones that have to say to their kids, no, you can’t even apply to the top 20 privates because we make JUST enough money not to receive much if any financial aid. But Johnny down the road who is very smart but has messed-up parent(s) who didn’t save & got divorced & consequently have a ridiculously low EFC is invited to these top institutions with open arms. Good for Johnny, I guess, but where did the middle class parent who tried to do everything right go so WRONG?</p>
<p>That’s the world we live in now. I’m not bitter because unless I’m very wrong, this skewed payment system will not change anytime soon, there’s little we can do about it, and my kids will be totally out of college in two years anyway. I just feel sorry for the parents embarking on this now–they’re in for a rude awakening, the likes of which you don’t necessarily hear at the college information night for HS juniors & their parents.</p>