Reasons for Raising Tuition Prices

Many students seem upset about all the budget cuts LBCC has proposed, and some take effect as soon as June 30.

Several students from SLC have conducted polls, surveys, and forums on the proposed cuts to gather input regarding student opinions and how they feel about the budget cuts.

School enrollment has been down for roughly three years if not more. During the end of winter term is when the numbers for student enrollment came in for fall term, and they didn’t look good. Even though enrollment has returned to pre-recession levels, it still seems low.

“We have experienced a decline in enrollment this year that is generating tuition revenue of about $1.67 million below what was budgeted,” said Jim Huckestein, vice-president of Finance and Operations. “The college is facing a projected budgetary shortfall of over $3 million dollars for next year.”

Rather than just raising tuition alone, 25 positions were cut from the college’s budget. Eight employees are retiring and 17 are being terminated. Overall, this keeps tuition increases at $3 more per credit instead of a higher amount.

The cost of employee retirement plans also factors in to why tuition will increase.
Since healthcare keeps rising, the school has to keep increasing the employees’ retirement in order to balance everything out.

“The cost of the Public Employees Retirement System is increasing dramatically, as is health insurance, in addition to inflationary increases,” said Huckestein. “The level of state support for next biennium has not been determined, but is unlikely to provide enough resources to balance our budget.”

With the $3 tuition increase and the differential surcharge on certain lab classes of approximately 20 percent, it is expected to bring in around $750,000.These budget cuts do have a silver lining. Pell grants are not currently on the chopping block and are not expected to have any changes for the 2013-14 academic school year.

Students interesting in hearing what school officials have to say may attend the meeting where the proposed cuts are presented to the Board of Education on April 17 at 5 p.m. at the college’s Lebanon Center.