Rising Cost of Higher Ed

Driven by a new round of state budget cuts to higher education in 2011, colleges and universities are again raising costs to students next year.

Those hikes in tuition and mandatory fees range from an extra $100 per year at Central New Mexico Community College to the $427 increase approved for students at New Mexico State University — the state’s highest hike.

Universities have increased the amounts charged to students partly to offset the tuition credit, which requires schools to either pass on a state-set increase or lose that amount of state funding the next year.

For four-year universities, the state mandated a 3.05 percent tuition credit. All four-year colleges in New Mexico are asking for that — and more.

For community colleges and university branches, where tuition is lower, the state asked schools to charge an extra 9.5 percent in tuition. Many of those two-year colleges, including CNM, limited their cost increases to the tuition credit and no more.

“We’re not going to get any more state money, we know that. We try to raise private funds, but in order to be able to provide the education that they deserve, it’s going to cost more money,” UNM spokeswoman Susan McKinsey said. “You can’t sit still and then compete on a national scale.”

Next year’s tuition and fee increases beyond the tuition credit are generally intended to invest in more teachers as enrollments have surged and new hiring has typically been frozen amid the weak economy.

That means colleges and universities have run short on teachers for the growth in students, who require more classroom space and course sections. For many New Mexico colleges, charging students extra tuition and fees allows them to afford new instructors in the classroom.

At New Mexico Tech, for example, the university could not afford to continue a freeze on faculty hiring, Tech spokesman Thomas Guengerich said.

“It is becoming more and more difficult to maintain the standard of quality education without being able to replace professors,” he said.

Tech expects to generate about $500,000 more next year so it can afford three new professors in high-demand departments. But colleges say they are sensitive to how much extra their students are having to pay.

“Anything greater than 8 percent, we felt, would have been particularly burdensome for our students,” Guengerich said.

UNM also pledged to devote money from its tuition hike to help fund an extra $2 million for new faculty and $563,000 for graduate student instructors.

But initial proposals to increase tuition by more than 8 percent drew protest from students. UNM later agreed to limit its tuition increase to 7 percent, although the total percentage increase falls to 5.5 percent when $1,158 in mandatory fees is factored into student costs.

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