Bailey Thompson | News Editor

Looking forward to the future of Western, there are some financial changes that will be unavoidable; however, there is a team who is actively dedicated to keeping Western affordable for upcoming generations of Wolves.

For the 2019-2020 academic year in particular, there are a number of significant changes to the Business Office and to tuition rates that will heavily impact the financial opportunities of Western students. Setting the tone, while many of Oregon’s public universities have either reported higher numbers or have not shared their tuition rates for next year yet, Western has committed to an increase of only 2.33% for undergraduate residents, which was decided by the Tuition and Fees Advisory Committee.

Evelyn Guzman, Erik Morgan and Ailyn Angel — student leaders and representatives on TFAC — shared what it was like for them to come to this decision.

“The administration is really great for doing this even before the House Bill (3381) was passed — they’ve listened to student voices, whereas a lot of other universities haven’t,” said Angel, a senior interdisciplinary studies major on the committee. “You never feel like you’re asking a dumb question, and they really allow us to be a part of the decision-making process.”

In addition to this small tuition increase, Western has also shown its commitment to affordability through other things like keeping the cost for room and board flat and keeping the incidental fee increase under 5%.

Another way that Western is making financial changes for the benefit of students relates to the Tuition Promise plan.

“When WOU Promise was initially created, it was an environment when double-digit tuition increases were very common… But since that time, the environment has changed and there is now a very low tuition increase, so it turns out that what they set out in their plan is more expensive than if they were without the plan,” said Dr. Karaman, Vice President for Finance and Administration. “Dr. Fuller always felt that it’s the right thing to do to give the lowest of the available rates. So, this year we just said, ‘let’s go ahead and do it.’”

Dr. Karaman credits Dona Vasas and Camarie Campfield, the Bursar and Budget Manager, as being instrumental to bringing these changes about as well.

A final couple of updates from the Business Office that will impact Western students beginning next academic year are that seniors will no longer have to pay a $50 fee to apply to graduate, and students will also have 30 days beyond when the term starts to pay their bill.

“Students are here for academics. Yes, they need to pay their bill, but let’s make sure that their bill isn’t impacting their academic achievement,” said Vasas.

Although there are a number of things to keep track of, the staff at the Business and Financial Aid Offices is dedicated to serving any students who have questions about how these changes could be impacting them.

“The overall goal is that we want Western to be the most affordable public university in the state of Oregon, and we also want to make sure that students don’t go into debt,” concluded Dr. Karaman.

Contact the author at howlnews@wou.edu

Photo by Ashlynn Norton