Tuition increase's effect on NEIU students

If money problems were not hard enough, new students will have an even more difficult time in paying tuition and fees.  During the Student Government Association (SGA) meeting on Tuesday, Jan. 12, Mark Wilcockson, the Vice President of Finance and Administration discussed the decreases of State appropriations and how "student tuition accounts for 46 percent of the University operating budget."  That is nearly half, up from 31 percent in fiscal year 2002. 

One thing that is helping students keep tuition affordable is the Public Act 93-0028, which states that students who are new enrollees starting from Fall 2004 will be locked-in, or held at a constant rate per credit hour for the next four continuous academic years.               

For example, if an individual is a new undergraduate student, whether a freshman or transfer student, in the fall of 2009 (Fiscal Year 2010) they will have a locked-in rate of $245 per credit hour for the next four years, or until they graduate, whichever comes first.

This means that the rate of tuition that was in effect when the student started will be the rate that they will be responsible for, which is a great advantage for older students because they do not have to worry about the tuition increase.  This system seems to keep NEIU affordable, at least for the time being. "The state of Illinois continues to fund Northeastern Illinois with less money every year," said Wilcockson.  This results in the raise of tuition that students may have noticed over the past few years. 

The Board of Trustees reviewed the preliminary 2011 budget request for the University back in June, and in September 2009 approved that budget request.  It has been submitted to the Board of Higher Education.

This will be followed by the governor announcing his budget for 2011 and then in the spring the General Assembly will be considering the various budgets to be discussed during their sessions and will have the education budget set sometime in May or June 2010. It has not yet been decided how much the increase will be.