To some, state-funded public education is worth nothing unless it can reach every person in the society it serves with the ability and willingness to earn a degree, regardless of income or social status. No doubt a factor of this goal would include a public university system that is completely state-funded, and each tuition increase since the UC system began charging its students no doubt makes it harder for low and middle income families to put their children through college.
Perhaps in theory, it is possible for every willing and able student to find enough funding to go to the University of California regardless of income; in practice, there is many a student struggling to stay in school because of extenuating family circumstances or single parenthood. The reality also includes a large state budget deficit that the University of California has been forced to mitigate along with other state agencies. While the increase in student fees no doubt takes us away from the ideal, the proposed implementation of the coming 11 percent increase is not only well-allocated, but long overdue in consideration of all facts.
The University of California is no doubt one of the best values in higher education available today; six of the eight undergraduate UC campuses are in the “”top 50″” of all universities of the country, and tuition for 2001-02 was well below the national average for four-year public schools — $3,429 per year at the University of California compared to $3,725 nationally. The historical trends are, in fact, staggering: over the past 10 years: four-year college tuition has risen 38 percent for the average student (The College Board, Annual Survey of College 2002-2003). The University of California, on the other hand, has not raised tuition in the past eight years, and in fact dropped tuition 10 percent during that period of time. California’s wealth has kept tuition artificially low compared to the rest of the nation.
These facts notwithstanding, critics of the fee increase argue that the University of California’s comparison to other institutions is irrelevant for a variety of reasons.
The first, perhaps, is a matter of principle: Why should a state budget deficit fall on the heads of students at a public university? Why not, instead, on the unnecessary incarceration of inmates? This is certainly a valid question, but it is not within the realm of the Regents’ control. The reality is that the University of California has been provided with less funding from the state, and it must be accounted for in the University of California somewhere.
But then why student fees? If the quality of research and of instruction are tantamount to the quality of education at the University of California and are subsequently sacrosanct, then administration and public service are the only places from which to cut funds. Indeed, about $10 million has been cut from public services, and $20 million from administration. The $19 million that the fee increase will cover seems relatively mild in comparison, especially when one considers that an extra $135 a quarter to attend a UC school is nothing compared to further limiting the educational opportunities of already neglected K-12 public schools.
Consider then, that a full third of the fee increase will go straight back into financial aid for the needy. This is a step long overdue; while quite a few of the University of California’s students no doubt are in dire need of aid, California’s wealth and the University of California’s quality also means that quite a few students will not be affected by the new $135 a quarter – or even $500 extra a quarter. If they are to be exploiting a system that should be equally accessible to all Californians, rich or poor, then increasing tuition to the national average and redirecting the difference towards financial aid would be a most appropriate step.
Another complaint of critics is that California’s cost of living is much higher than that of the rest of the country, distorting the seeming deflated cost of California tuition. As officers of Associated Students at the UC Berkeley pointed out, “”A first-year student in Charlottesville, Va., pays over $4,000 less than his or her counterpart in La Jolla.”” No doubt housing in La Jolla, Westwood, Calif., or Berkeley, Calif., is expensive compared to most other areas of the country. But this is a rather deceiving argument; housing is more expensive in California on the whole compared to the rest of the country, so a student out on his or her own will pay that wherever they are. Also, there are two Universities of California, Riverside and Davis, at which housing is relatively inexpensive. Merced, in the middle of farmland, should also have a low cost of living.
Furthermore, not only are California’s urban and clerical wages higher than those of the rest of the country, they have been rising faster than those of the rest of the country for the last five years, according to the California Department of Industrial Relations. The $4,000 difference between Virginia and La Jolla is deceiving; California’s students not only have more choices between Universities of California, they also have better wages and an excellent community college system close to nearly every community that lets them save money while completing the first two years of their education.
Lastly, critics, including Lieutenant Governor Cruz Bustamante, who sits with the UC Regents, have called the fee increase “”premature,”” calling for more time to review the action. These critics contend that students and families have not had enough time to prepare; this may be true for the California State University system, since its new fees take effect this month. UC students, however, have until spring quarter. Furthermore, time is money — this increase is clearly inevitable, as the 11-4 vote of the Regents showed, and to run a debate to satisfy the small minority exploiting the issue as a meaningless populist stand (and who may only oppose the increase because it is safe to do so without jeopardizing it) would simply allow money to bleed into interest.
The students of the University of California have been living in a time bubble for the last eight years; rises in college tuition are far outpacing inflation, and California’s prosperity has been growing disproportionately as well. This tuition increase not only maintains the quality of the UC system, it does its best — through redirecting a third to financial aid — to guarantee that the system remains accessible to all students.
