The California State University Board of Trustees approved the budget request for 2008-09 Tuesday that could result in more student tuition increases.
The budget for the upcoming year totaled $4.8 billion, but did not include student fee costs.
Student fees are held separate from the budget request, and the governor and legislature were told to provide a “fee buy-out,” which means they need to give the CSU $73 million. If they don’t give it to them, student fees could increase by 10 percent.
If the CSU system does receive the funding it needs, then the fee increase should not be necessary. If it were, it would be discussed and approved no later than the March 2008 board of trustees meeting.
Paul Browning, a CSU spokesman, said, “The CSU remains one of the best deals of four-year universities in the nation. It is comparably lower to similar universities.”
Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, an trustee for the CSU and member of the UC Board of Regents, voted against the budget and disagreed with the plan of increasing student fees if the governor and legislature decide not to provide funding.
“Enough is enough. Cal State and UC fees should be stabilized at current levels, in constant dollars,” Garamendi wrote in a co-written opinion column with John Oakley for the Los Angeles Times on Nov. 15. “That means no future increases except to keep pace with inflation.”
Lydia Sondhi, CSULB’s California Faculty Association chapter president and associate professor in family and consumer science, said that higher fees will impact those students who are now only marginally able to afford CSULB tuition.
She said that CSULB President F. King Alexander has been working hard to collect additional student aid, and that CSULB is still the most affordable of all CSU campuses when taking into account the amount of student aid available.
Sondhi also said that the CSU is still a good value when considering tuition fees, but that the cost of living in California exceeds the cost of living in most other areas of the country.
Sondhi also said that students probably have to work more to be able to afford to live as well as go to school, and some of her own students have to commit themselves to many things outside of school, like work and family.
“We are one of the lowest-priced universities for the caliber of education we provide,” Browning said. “It’s hard to find a better deal than the CSU – even with the 10-percent hike.”
