It’s budget-hunting season at PSU President Wim Wiewel’s office, and boy has he found a catch.
Given that the 2011–12 budget is facing challenges, an expected $23.7 million gap to fill and a graduation rate of 35 percent, the administration is generally optimistic that they can efficiently balance it well.
Their solution: capitalize on Portland. According to the pdx.edu website, “the University has a goal of increasing out-of-state enrollment to 30 percent over the next four to five years as a way of bringing in more tuition dollars. Currently, 20 percent of PSU students pay out-of-state tuition. By comparison, University of Oregon’s out-of-state enrollment is 40 percent.”
What we have here is a diminishing of Oregon state funds into the higher education system— a bitter $17.7 million when combined with federal dollars, subtract this from budget cuts, and we have our overall need. There is an admittedly “limited” budget, which necessitates tuition adjustments and tends to realign the allocation of funds. According to the budget report itself, this redistribution of currency is in terms of multimillions, requiring an increase of tuition revenue by $11.3 million for the next year.
Part of the plan seems to be to take advantage of the higher tuition rate charged toward non-resident students. That which needs to be asked, is why does the president of Portland State determine that the wallets best suited for extraction are those of out-of-state students?
The national average for out-of-state tuition is near $12,000, while the average for a resident just over $10,000, which is not a huge difference in terms of the grueling reality of college loans. PSU’s numbers show, respectively, $18,792 and $6,036! That is a gigantic divide, one that should perhaps be remedied.
Out-of-state tuition costs are designed to cover for the state-contribution the University would have received during the length of the student’s residency. If state contribution to the school decreases, so should the idea that some students are charged more than others.
Residents are taxed by the state, in part to pay for higher education. If the state is allocating fewer funds to higher education and if those monetary gaps are filled by specific groups of people (in this case, those from outside the state), then one can expect those retention and graduation rates to drop amongst that group.
Students from the same country, yet from different coasts or regions, contribute to the concept of “diversity” as much as a foreigner and, even if you must perceive diversity as mere nationality, out-of-state students contribute equally as much to the “transplant” crowd that is becoming more prevalent in Portland.
PSU holds to the value of diversity, while potential higher prices for the “diverse” might turn them away from attending in the future. Tuition hikes for residents might turn us away. If PSU plans to depend on non-residents to help fill our financial gap, they need to present an attractive price tag without frustrating either party—which given the difference between the two tuitions, I’m surprised this hasn’t happened. Yet.
Portland’s recently perceived popularity (a la “Portlandia”) may be capitalized upon during a possible influx of young folks from not-too-distant lands. While I doubt that the administration would explicitly cite that potentiality as reasoning for population goals, I will hope they have enough foresight to look at how PSU’s culture and the budget interact.
While the budget development process continues, (this is only a proposed outline) students will get a last-minute chance to influence the final decision on tuition hikes on May 11.
Whichever way budgeters choose, the administration is stuck in a double bind directive—that of increasing rates while swelling the population of non-residents, all while maintaining PSU as an accessible education. ?