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BOG Asks Legislators to Return Tuition Revenue

Tuition increases for undergraduates and graduate students, approved by UNC’s trustees last fall, have been approved by the UNC System Board of Governors.

The BOG voted Friday to increase tuition 5.2 percent for all undergraduate students and 3.7 percent for graduate students, effective this fall.

In dollars, the increases mean undergraduate and graduate resident tuition will increase $200 a year; fees for all undergraduates will go up $96 a year, or 5.5 percent. The trustees had followed the recommendation of Chancellor Holden Thorp ’86.

As of now, the state’s General Fund will receive all of the increase paid by N.C. students and the first $200 of increases from nonresident students. Because of the state’s revenue shortfall, the N.C. General Assembly last year put an end, at least temporarily, to campus-based increases that had been the norm for several years and that had enabled individual schools in the UNC System to keep revenues raised from tuition increases. Additional revenue from the higher increase for nonresidents can still be kept on individual campuses.

At the urging of UNC System President Erskine Bowles ’67, the BOG on Friday adopted a proposal to keep money generated from increased tuition on campuses rather than going into the General Fund.

The proposal will go to the N.C. General Assembly when its short session begins in May.

“Under the Board of Governors’ alternative proposal, North Carolina residents would typically pay less and the funds would stay on the campuses where they’re generated with at least half those funds going to need-based financial aid,” said Joni Worthington ’83, the system’s vice president for communications. She said legislators indicated to Bowles some months ago “that they would at least be open to having all options on the table.”

Starting next fall, annual tuition and fees are expected to be $5,921 for in-state undergraduates, $24,736 for out-of-state undergraduates, $7,457 for in-state graduate students and $22,387 for out-of-state graduate students.

The revenue that could be returned to the Chapel Hill campus under the present structure would be about $4 million, which would be used for faculty salaries, student financial aid and academic support, including libraries.

Last year, Carolina’s tuition went up an average of 4.2 percent for resident students. UNC’s tuition has increased in four of the past six years.


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