Purdue officials say tuition rise is inevitable, necessary

College everywhere sure isn't cheap.

Purdue isn't exactly a pack of Ramen Noodles, either. Attending Purdue, however, recently became more expensive following the approval of a 7.5 percent tuition and fees increase passed by the Purdue Board of Trustees.

At first, I felt sickened by it. 7.5 percent is an immense increase for both in- and out-of-state students. That increases the cost of a resident education by $292. A non-resident diploma now sports a price tag that increased $968 per year. That's a lot for anyone.

I received a packet with a lot of information and numbers so that I might try to understand why Purdue feels that an increase of this magnitude is unavoidable.

Upon glancing at the budget informational packet, I equally regretted not paying attention in my low-level algebra class two years ago as I did putting off my basic statistics class until my final semester. But I realized that the only numbers I needed to make sense of this financial meat and potatoes were the ones on my telephone.

I made several calls to try to make sense of the mumbo jumbo and I realized one thing is certain - students are the ones paying.

I started this with a need to point a finger and blame someone for charging me an extra five bills on my next fee statement. But, much to my initial dissatisfaction, I found out that no one party is to blame for what seems to be extortion in exchange for education.

The state failed to give Purdue officials the money they felt they needed to ensure that Purdue is an institution that offers a top-shelf education and that the name Purdue remains one that is synonymous with academic excellence.

We certainly want prospective employers to continue to be impressed when they see that our diplomas are wrapped in Purdue envelopes. Well, quality education comes at price. Now it's just a more expensive one.

But don't tell Purdue officials you think the tuition is too expensive. You'll just receive a complicated Big Ten Conference breakdown. They'll tell you how the cost of a Purdue education is still less expensive than that of almost all other Big Ten institutions. That may be so. And it may be a fair comparison, if you look at out-of-state costs in a comparative fashion. But it's not a fair juxtaposition to look at Big Ten institutions and what each charges for resident rates.

It's not as if Indiana residents are going to Michigan or Wisconsin with a goal of garnering in-state status. Hoosiers do leave and attend other Big Ten schools, but with how near impossible it is to become an in-state student at any big-business school, almost all out-of-towners end up paying the large non-resident fees. So, stating that Purdue's in-state rate is lower is true, but it is also only good news for Indiana natives. All others will be subject to Purdue's non-resident rates - which they will.

I know as an out-of-state resident that short of taking a year off from Purdue, becoming an official Hoosier (even if you work part-time jobs and pay Indiana state taxes) is impossible. So the comparison to other Big Ten universities is only half-applicable, if at all.

Kent Weldon, deputy commissioner for the Indiana Commission for Higher Education, agrees that conference comparisons aren't always sole justification for an increase of this magnitude.

"The student that's attending in-state to go to Purdue University is not really in competition with the student who lives in Wisconsin and goes to the University of Wisconsin. That's not a competitive market. The non-residents are very much in a competitive market. So, I don't really think that this notion of 'we're lower than the Big Ten' really is applicable to the discussion of in-state fees."

So if it's not applicable, then why the urgent need to be equally expensive as other Big Ten schools? If all other Big Ten schools jumped off a bridge, would Purdue have to just to say we're equal? I'm sure our mothers would say no.

So does Weldon's office.

"The goal here is not to have the same fee that the state of Illinois has or the same fee that the folks in Michigan have. That's not the goal here."

Well if that's not the goal, then what is?

Perhaps other than preserving the quality of the Purdue diploma, students are making up for a lack of money given to the University by the state.

Purdue's funds, after all, were significantly cut from just a year ago.

University treasurer Ken Burns points to the fact that Purdue's primary allocations from the state education budget this year were almost $2 million lower than last year's.

But, why are Purdue officials panicking? The three appropriations of concern (Purdue's operating appropriations, technology appropriations and repair and rehabilitation appropriations) are to increase more than two-and-a-quarter million dollars in fiscal year 2003 from this past year. Yes, I understand that part of the '03 increase will go toward making up for a loss taken in the 2002 decrease, but, it's still an increase. Maybe I could understand the large increase in fees to help a consistent or long-term problem. If Purdue's appropriations were taking a hit for the past several years, then sure, something else needs to be done. But to increase tuition three percent more than it was increased last year because of one year of loss isn't a fair solution.

So why not discuss the potential salary freeze or a reduction of the 3 to 3.5 percent raise for faculty and staff as a possible contributing solution?

According to Burns, this was not an option. In fact, being able to give the Purdue professors a pay raise was considered one of the principal reasons for the tuition increase.

"We had to do it, or simply we'd be unable to recruit the first-tier faculty," said Burns. "We'd simply end up with an increase in the number of vacancies."

Burns is right.

Other major universities in the Big Ten, almost all of which charge more in tuition and fees, have a much larger revenue than Purdue does. Only Penn State University receives less (in-state) appropriations per student ($5,674) then Purdue ($6,077). Therefore, it's easy to recruit, pay and retain the nations best professors when your school generates millions of dollars more in revenue.

"They can recruit any kind of faculty member they want in the world," Burns said.

So, it's back to blaming the state legislature for not providing Purdue with what it needs to retain quality faculty while making the cost of attendance affordable.

Well, maybe the state did give Purdue what it needed.

"With the state appropriations that Purdue was given, tuition would have only had to increase 5 percent," Weldon said.

He said that with an increase of 5 percent, which is similar to other in-state increases and more along the lines of what Purdue has done in years past, the University could have accomplished what it needed to and "scraped by" enough, subsequently keeping tuition low.

"We were certainly surprised and disappointed by the size of the Purdue fee increase," Weldon said. "It has more than doubled the increase built into our state student aid programs. That means that unless you have additional support from someone else, many students won't be able to pay the bill."

And when students pay the bill, the amount of student loan-related debt continues to accumulate quickly. Let's face it, a Purdue diploma doesn't guarantee you work upon graduation. For the price you pay for your education, which Purdue officials still maintain is a bargain, you should receive some continual placement contract, but that isn't possible. And unless you're an engineering, management or technology student, you're not going to be making enough money to repay your college debt before you die.

This debt is large enough without having to tack on an extra $1,000 per year because the state gave the school less money.

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