By: Jade Rayner
News Editor

On Wednesday, April 26 the Board of Trustees met to discuss various topics pertaining to Western, including the recommended tuition range for the 2017-2018 academic year.

According to the meeting minutes, it was important to set a tuition range for the 2017-2018 academic year because of upcoming Higher Education Coordinating Commission deadlines.

The proposal for the tuition range was presented by Western’s Vice President for Finance and Administration Eric Yahnke.

The minutes relay that “Trustee Martin described how a tuition range could be used to continue conversations with students. Shetterly added that a range could be used to continue conversations with legislators … Baumgartner called for a motion to approve the 2017-2018 tuition range (5-10% increase for resident undergraduate variable rate tuition and 10-20% increase for resident undergraduate Western Promise rate).” The motion passed 7-2.

In an interview with President Rex Fuller the following day, he was asked what plans Western had to increase student enrollment. President Fuller replied, “one of the things that’s happened in Oregon is the Oregon Promise, which has provided funding for students to go to community colleges at a lesser cost than they would the four years. And that actually has led to a number of students going to the two year colleges that otherwise may have come to the four years. So, Chemeketa alone, over a thousand students enrolled under the Oregon Promise last fall.”

He went on to say, “one of the things we are trying to do is because those students are now at the two years, is trying to refresh and revise the way in which a student would transfer from the two years to the four years to finish their degree … on top of that we continue to work the high school graduating class … so we are seeing a downturn in new freshmen, we are trying to replace that with an upturn in transfers.”

According to Fuller, Western signed a dual admission program with Clackamas Community College this year, which will create an easier path for transfer students.

“Going back to March of last year, the university submitted to the Higher Education Coordinating Committee a unified budget for all seven institutions, and we identified the amount we would need just to cover our cost … our total budget for all universities needed to go up to $765 million. The governor’s budget right now is $667 million, which leaves roughly that $100 million gap,” Fuller responded when asked what students could expect to see in the future.

“The latest response by the joint Ways and Means Committee,” Fuller explained, “is that they’ve added about $20 million to the governor’s number … what our Board of Trustees approved yesterday with a vote to go forward is basically a sliding scale, which says that our tuition will be between 5 and 10 percent, and it will depend upon how much of that gap gets closed; so the gap’s $100 million, and we say ‘for every $20 million that gap gets closed, we’ll lower that increase by one percent’ … essentially our approach mirrors what University of Oregon did which is created a set of tradeoffs.”

In the April 26 issue of The Western Journal, President Fuller’s guest column left the question, “is this a blip or will the legislature maintain their investment?” Referring to the decrease in state funding to the university.

To elaborate on that question, Fuller said, “I’ve been here two years now … in the year I arrived there actually was an increase in funding for higher education, and we deeply appreciated it … to maintain that level of funding was that $765 million figure, because that covered our cost, the inflation plus cost. So if we don’t fill that gap, we then fall behind again, and so that’s the big challenge … Whether this is a blip or not is going to depend on that lobbying effort. We’re trying to convince the legislature and the governor that that investment that was made in 2015-2017 needs to be sustained.”

As of now, it’s too soon to determine whether or not additional funding will be provided to sustain the investment. According to Fuller, the process will continue through the academic year.

“We continue to try and meet with legislators,” stated Fuller. “On May 16, there is going to be what’s called True Day … there’s going to be a full day of lobbying in the state house, in the capitol.”

Fuller encouraged student involvement in the event and said, “all students are welcome. There will be a chance to be put into teams; there will be some talking points that we all agree on that are being prepared, the idea is to go have some face to face time with legislators and say ‘your investment in higher education matters.’”

Reflecting on True Day, he concluded, “the impact we had last year with an all-university day was profound … I think those are effective demonstrations of voice, and to have students be numerous in that voice and also telling their own story frankly has more impact than if I say it … you are the future of the nation and the state, and in that sense you have in many ways more credibility than I do as an employee.”

Fuller stated that students with questions about True Day can ask ASWOU for more information, or can contact him with questions about the event.

Contact the author at journalnews@wou.edu