• Registered: 02-12-2010
  • Posts: 1

Topic: Universties are worried about tuition CAP's

I would be interested in how many students are using the PACT program per in-state school.  And how much the schools would lose each year compared to overall revenue from tuition, if the bill passes with the tuition CAP.  I would venture to say it would be miniscule.  Has this been pointed out to our legislatures and the Board of Trustees?

  • From: Decatur, Alabama
  • Registered: 12-30-2009
  • Posts: 23

Re: Universties are worried about tuition CAP's

I think you would be correct.  I think the schools thinking would be, if they put a cap on this, then they will want to put a cap on something else.  The schools do not want to give up one ounce of power.

Last edited by lrterry (02-12-2010 2:31:57 pm)

  • Registered: 08-10-2009
  • Posts: 71

Re: Universties are worried about tuition CAP's

Alabama's enrollment is about 28,000 and Auburn's is 23,000. Per last Fall's Actuarial Report (p B-1) there were 6,675 PACT students at UA for the 08/09 year, and 5,840 at AU, so each is about 25% of the total student population. PACT tuition paid at UA that year was $19.3M and at AU was $18.0M, so total annual tuition at each school was somewhere around $75M.

If either school wanted to raise tuition by 7.5% then a 2.5% cap would cost them 5%, or just under $1M/yr, which is approximately 1.3% of current total tuition. The amount of lost tuition would increase each time tuition is increased as the differential would be based on the prior tuition amount which already had a gap.

This doesn't seem miniscule to me, and I doubt it does to the leaders of our Universities either. This is not to say that I hope that they don't accept the proposed cap, but rather to show why I wish our legislators wouldn't put all their eggs in this one basket.

I've argued here before to take money from the Alabama Trust Fund. Currently, the principal in the fund is sitting and growing as more O&G money comes in each year. Only the earned interest is earmarked. Seems like either future O&G royalties could be diverted to fund PACT (which technically wouldn't even be tapping the Trust Fund), or current ATF principal could be removed and later replaced by future royalties. Either way, interest cash flow would be uninterrupted, no taxpayers would pay a hard earned dime, tuition caps wouldn't have to be considered, and all PACT contracts would be honored.

Last edited by KBinHoover (02-12-2010 5:18:57 pm)

  • Registered: 03-27-2009
  • Posts: 35

Re: Universties are worried about tuition CAP's

These are three questions which I would like answered:

1.  If the colleges are so concerned about discrimination in reference to different tuition rates, why are there instate and out-of-state tuition rates?

2.  If the state funds K5-12 with our taxes and students attend free (per se), and they also fund instate colleges, why can our children not attend college FREE?

3. Why is Mississippi considering changing to a single tuition rate for instate as well as out-of-state students because they are losing so many to other states, such as Alabama, with the "gift" the Alabama Legislature has given in the State Code (thereby controlling tuition costs in lieu of the college trustees doing so, which is one of their very verbal arguments against some of the proposals)?

Mississippi Senate measure looks at in-state tuition for all » Memphis Commercial Appeal Mobile

http://m.commercialappeal.com/news/2010 … re-waives/

Sheila

  • Registered: 03-28-2009
  • Posts: 15

Re: Universties are worried about tuition CAP's

I'D LIKE TO KNOW JUST HOW THE 1.3 PERCENT THEY WOULD LOSE TO THE CAP COMPARES TO HOW MUCH OF MY HARD EARNED TAX MONEY AND YOURS THEY GET EVERY YEAR.

They too are citizens of this state. They were indeed Chardered to Serve the other Citizens of the state. It is time for them to step up and be good citizens and contripbute to the Solution as the AEA did.

it is not concern that motivates them it is pure greed. Face it.