By snoadmin
More than 10,000 students enrolled in summer session classes at Cal State Long Beach received an e-mail notification from Student Account Services July 11 – during finals week of the first summer session – showing an additional $30 student fee charged to their accounts. The fee will go toward offsetting summer operational costs in the University Student Union.
Student Account Services first posted the extra fee on the Sunday before (July 8), but the explanation for the charge was not sent until July 12 – a day after the first e-mail notification. The explanatory e-mail said the fee was added because of an “administrative oversight,” although the fee increase was approved in May 2006, according to CSULB Bursar Nancy Eckhous.
“This is an oversight on our part,” Eckhous said in response to the $30 amount being accidentally excluded from the original summer student USU charge. “We normally like to give students notice because, when the campus can control it, we definitely don’t want to surprise people.”
Shockwaves of surprise, however, hit students last week when they noticed the fee increase from $7 to $37 in an attempt to “cover the increased costs of year round operations,” and offset a growing summer USU deficit, according to the explanatory e-mail.
“I am furious,” said senior sociology major Susan Mc Clurg via e-mail. “I don’t estimate my fees each semester; I wait until after registration to have an actual total for my loan request. I was told it was an oversight, but it went from $7 to $37 – more than five times the previous amount. That’s approximately the price of a textbook or my monthly electric bill.”
Dave Edwards, the associate executive director of Associated Students Inc., stated that summer session student fees have been locked in at $7 since the USU opened in 1972 and, as of 2001 (when CSULB began year-round registration), the income generated from the small fee has been drastically insufficient to cover summer USU operation and maintenance expenses.
“In order to make up for these costs and lack of revenue during the summer, the USU has used funds from the fall and spring student fees to balance our budget each year,” Edwards via e-mail. “That means the USU had to use fees paid by fall and spring students to operate the building for summer students.”
The fee increase, however, will only solve half of the deficit problem, according to Edwards, who estimated the summer USU deficit to be $730,000 annually. Even if each student pays the increased fee, the deficit will still be running at more than $360,000.
Edwards said spring and fall student fee-generated income will still have to be utilized to balance the summer budget, but the losses won’t be as great, noting in an e-mail that the fee will ensure that “all students share the cost of operating the USU year round,” not just spring and fall registrants.
“Summer students will be glad to know this change means some very positive things for them,” Edwards said.
“The USU can now remain open longer during the summer, which means many of the offices in this building that would have normally closed early can instead extend their hours to provide service to students at later hours.”
The extended hours will apply to campus vendors like El Pollo Loco, Round Table Pizza and Subway as well, according to Edwards.
Despite the error, Eckhous also mentioned some positive effects concerning the fee increase.
“We are very proud on this campus because our fees that we charge all incoming students are the lowest amongst the 23 campuses [in the California State University system],” Eckhous said.
“In fact, we review once a year and a number of fees are suspended or cancelled because of what a good job the departments are doing monitoring and making sure that we’re only collecting what we need to cover the costs.”
Describing some student reactions, Eckhous said, “We have had some calls from students, and they are of course not happy about it, but they’ve been very understanding once we explained what happened.”
Among those students is senior business major Cindy Nou, who said, “I was surprised to find out I owed $30 after I had already paid my tuition months ago. If anything I think they should have postponed the charge until next summer. It wasn’t fair.”
The $30 fee is due August 15, and registration holds will apply if it remains unpaid. Questions regarding the fee increase can be directed to Student Account Services at (562) 985-8280.
