Issue date: 2/6/08 Section: NEWS

Media Credit: Whitney Buster NT President Gretchen Bataille and Vice President for Finance and Administration, Andrew Harris, spoke yesterday on behalf of a school wide tuition increase. Only a few students and faculty attended, even though the hearing was open to everyone.

Students may see a 7.9 percent increase in their tuition next year in order for the university to hire new faculty members. A meeting was held yesterday to discuss a proposal to increase tuition and fees for 2009 and 2010.
President Gretchen Bataille and Andrew Harris, the vice chancellor for finance, discussed the proposed plan in a small room of four students and eight administrators and faculty members.
If the proposal is passed, there will be an increase of $247, or 7.9 percent, added to each semester. Union fees will increase by $1.
Harris said the increase will make the 2008 semester's tuition cost of $3,136 become $3,383 in the fall of 2009. In 2010, the increase would possibly be another 7.9 percent in tuition, making the fall of 2010 cost $3,650 per semester.
If the tuition increase is approved, the money will be dispersed where it will benefit the university, he said. About $2.8 million will go toward need-based financial aid. It will also help to increase advisers' salaries and hire new faculty, as well as put more money in work-study programs.
"We're not asking to support a Neiman Marcus pair of Jimmy Choo's, but we're tired of buying plastic shoes at Wal-Mart," Bataille said.
Four-year institutions are recommended to have one adviser for every 285 students. NT's adviser-student ratio is one adviser for every 567 students. The goal for NT in 2011 is to go from about 20 faculty members per student to 19.5 per student.
"UNT needs to make some strides forward, especially in areas of student-faculty ratios and student-advising ratios," SGA president Josh Ness said. "A moderate tuition increase is the first step in achieving those goals."
If NT's tuition is increased and if no other school raises tuition, NT would go from the second lowest tuition to the third lowest. Bataille said NT's quality is a "great value for students."
In order to get the 7.9 percent, Bataille said she started out with a 3 percent exercise by asking institutions throughout the university what they would give up if they conceded 3 percent and then what they would need if they received the 3 percent back. This caused the percent to go from 10 percent to 7.9 percent.
The 7.9 percent is a cap and guarantees the students it will not go over that percentage if approved. The fallacy of a percentage is that the dollar amount needs to be the same, but the base at every university is different.
"Our 7.9 percent increase is less than a five percent increase at UT," Harris said.
The Finance Committee and the Board of Regents will discuss the proposed tuition increase Thursday beginning at 9 a.m. and will have results on the ruling either Thursday night or Friday morning. The meetings will be held at the NT Dallas Campus.

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