On Friday, Portland State President Wim Wiewel delivered a message to the Associated Students of Portland State University’s student fee committee in person: Do not raise student fees, no matter how tempting or necessary it may seem.
On Friday, Portland State President Wim Wiewel delivered a message to the Associated Students of Portland State University’s student fee committee in person: Do not raise student fees, no matter how tempting or necessary it may seem.
Wiewel met with the SFC as the committee begins to consider the 2013–14 budget requests of
hundreds of fee-funded student organizations, which have begun to put together their own budget wish lists.
The SFC is in charge of the roughly $14 million in incidental fees that are collected from students along with tuition each term. The committee approves or denies budget requests for these funds and prepares an overall budget. The committee submits the budget to the student senate, and it is then passed along to the university president for approval.
This fall, about 30,300 students enrolled in the university, up from about 29,000 in fall 2011. While PSU is definitely not lacking in students, the modest increase in enrollment means there won’t be significantly more money next year to put into student programs.
“That’s why I like having modest growth to student enrollment,” Wiewel said. “Of course there are two sources to solve this. One is increasing enrollment and the other is [increasing] the student fee…and I’m not a fan of that.”
Wiewel is hoping to see more research as to why enrollment is not increasing, especially since enrollment in higher education is at an all-time high. Tuition might be one issue, he said, since if a student cannot pay tuition he or she cannot attend.
“This actually presents a real challenge,” he said. “While there are many things we would like to do with more money, whether it is from the student fee or not…The truth is we don’t have a way to do those things.”
The minimum amount a student is charged in fees for the 2012–13 year is $51 per term, but an undergraduate taking 12 credits will pay $216.
Every year, the SFC revisits how much students will pay in fees.
“I ask that you do not assume a model that will raise the student fee unless there is an extremely compelling reason why it has to be done…I will look at that greatly with skepticism.”
After this request, SFC Chair Nick Rowe told Wiewel that this year the SFC is requiring all organizations funded with student fees, such as student affairs and athletics, to submit a more detailed spending report as part of next year’s budget proposal.
“We are doing this to make sure that each area is getting as much needed funding as possible,” Rowe said. He then asked if Wiewel could foresee any conflicts in funding these organizations with the student fees anticipated.
“I don’t think so,” Wiewel replied. “The main thing is that our enrollment isn’t down, it’s flat…we’re not making less money.”
