President Neil Kerwin believes that the Board of Trustees will increase tuition by the lowest amount in AU history, he said during a public town hall on Nov. 15.
“My guess is that the Board will require us in this next cycle to work within in a range that is the lowest in memory,” he said.
Kerwin said he does not believe a tuition freeze or a fixed tuition is achievable at AU.
Universities that implement a fixed tuition often hit the incoming freshman class with a tuition increase of as much as 16 percent to account the school’s need to increase 4 percent tuition each year to maintain the university, he said.
The school has also reallocated money from merit-based aid to need-based aid and increased the amount of Pell grant-eligible students to help AU’s accessibility, Kerwin said.
“How can we continue to keep this University competitive, to insure that the quality of the education everyone receives allows them to be competitive in the world they leave in, without making it out of reach for anything other than the most wealthy of society?” Kerwin asked the audience. “If we can accomplish that, than we’ve accomplished something substantial.”
Both Kerwin and Sine said financial aid would be a priority during the budget decisions. In order to maintain diversity, Kerwin and the Board decided to increase tuition and financial aid, Sine said.
“We [AU] could go the other way,” Sine said. “We could cut tuition and only admit student who are fully capable of paying full frame—full tuition. We could cut tuition if we did that. We are not going to do that.”
Kerwin addresses smoking ban concerns
A committee will be made to address implementation that includes faculty, staff and administration from the Office of Campus Life. The group will also look how smoking traffic will affect the neighbors, using Towson University, which implemented a smoking ban last year, as an example, according to Kerwin.
The committee will also include students, Maralee Csellar, the associate director of media relations, said in an email.
Kerwin chose a complete ban instead of designated areas because he believes that it would put too much pressure on Public Safety to maintain the designated areas.
“I don’t pretend it was an easy decision or it’ll be an easy one to implement,” Kerwin said.
hmongilio@theeagleonline.com
