<p>I knew that deal was too good to last. Now they are looking at increasing OOS tuition to closer to market rate.</p>
<p>While this will certainly disappoint many, it had to be hard to justify such a low OOS cost. It would seem that the instate students were subsidizing the OOS students.</p>
<p>The university charges tuition and fees of $18,774 for out-of-state and international undergraduates, and $13,524 for in-state. In contrast, the University of Wisconsin charges $26,628 for nonresidents and $10,379 for residents. In the Big Ten, nonresident tuition and fees averages $29,328. Minnesota is the cheapest of those dozen schools. But when it comes to residents, Minnesota is the group’s fourth-most-expensive.</p>
<p>Yeah this is really upsetting…U Minn was my #1 choice, but if tuition increases by more than a couple thousand by next year, I’ll have to take it off my list.</p>
<p>One thing that wasn’t clear from the article was whether the OOS cost was the price in-state students would pay if U Minn didn’t receive state subsidies, or if it was some arbitrarily number that was too low to help support instate students. Did I just miss that, or did the article omit that point?</p>
<p>A big question for prospective and CURRENT OOS UMinn students is whether a big increase will occur at any point during their 4 years. Even if the increase doesn’t happen in 2013, will it happen in 2014? 15? At any point of their college years? If the school doesn’t “grandfather” the current OOS students, there could be some sophs or juniors or seniors who suddenly can’t afford to continue.</p>
<p>*One thing that wasn’t clear from the article was whether the OOS cost was the price in-state students would pay if U Minn didn’t receive state subsidies, or if it was some arbitrarily number that was too low to help support instate students. Did I just miss that, or did the article omit that point?
*</p>
<p>It may not be clear, but I think it’s safe to say that it costs more than $18k to educate an OOS student, so something/someone is subsidizing those students. Maybe other states subsidize OOS students, too, but maybe not by such a large amount. </p>
<p>Many other flagships are charging $22k-30k+ per year for OOS students, so it does appear that something is subsidizing the UMinn OOS students by a good amount.</p>
<p>Actually that is about the average direct cost to educate undergrads at a major flagship. The amount over that net of fin aid could be used to subsidize instate students and perhaps lower or level their tuition for a few years. Or you could just call it profit.</p>
<p>Sometimes, low OOS tuition is a strategy to attract OOS students in hope that they will eventually stay and contribute to the state economy afterward. That may have been more common in past decades when states had healthy budgets and could spare some money for such “long term investments”. But some states do this now, but targeted with discounts (merit scholarships) for high stats OOS students (e.g. Alabama is a well known example) rather than low OOS tuition for everyone.</p>