It’s not unusual for major universities to rebase tuition or, in other words, add a set amount of money into total tuition costs on top of normal tuition increases, experts say.

But some higher education experts said the tuition rebase Syracuse University plans to execute next fall to start the 2018-19 academic year is unusually pricey.

“Some colleges have much smaller initiatives, but $3,300 a year is quite large,” said Robert Kelchen, an assistant professor in the department of education leadership, management and policy at Seton Hall University.

SU, as part of a five-year $100 million academic fundraising pledge, plans to rebase tuition by adding a $3,300 premium into total tuition costs for first-year and transfer students.

It’s not uncommon for colleges to rebase tuition in small increments to pay for special projects such as a new academic building or program, an expert said, but SU’s plan is unique in some ways.

“In this case, it certainly sounds like a tuition increase and they are just putting a label on what they are going to be doing with the extra money for everybody,” said Donald Heller, provost and vice president of academic affairs at the University of San Francisco.

Including an expected 3.9 percent tuition hike, the premium will increase total tuition costs next year to $50,230, said M. Dolan Evanovich, the university’s senior vice president for enrollment and the student experience, last semester.

For the 2017-18 academic year, tuition was $45,150 at the university for first-year and transfer students.

Students currently enrolled at the university will be grandfathered in and won’t have to pay the extra money, university officials have said.

Despite Invest Syracuse being a five-year plan, a spokesman for the university last September said the premium won’t be taken out of total tuition costs when SU reaches its $100 million funding goal. That money will continue to support Invest Syracuse-funded programs, he said at the time.

Most private universities will fund major initiatives through tuition increases, while donors might play a small role, Kelchen said.

“Most colleges will fund these initiatives through tuition because most private colleges have their budgets highly driven by tuition,” Kelchen said.

Tuition is also increasing at some of SU’s peer institutions. In March 2017, Lehigh University announced a tuition increase of $2,400, or 5 percent in tuition costs, raising annual tuition from $47,920 to $50,320.

According to The Brown and White, the university’s student newspaper, Lehigh’s vice president of finance and administration has said the tuition funds will go toward hiring new faculty, improving academic buildings and expanding programs and financial aid opportunities. These plans are similar to what SU administrators have said Invest Syracuse funds will be used for, including tenure-track faculty hires and additional financial aid opportunities, among other things.

“We determined the new tuition level following a thorough competitive analysis of what other similar universities are charging,” Evanovich said in a statement to The Daily Orange on Wednesday. “We discovered that our tuition rates were significantly below our peers. The fact that tuition has lagged our national peers for several years has held us back from investing in the future the way our students, faculty and alumni expect.

“Combined with an increased availability of scholarships, and resources generated by administrative cost reductions, the new tuition level provides the resources vital to achieve our ambitious, but attainable goals.”

At Boston College, the university’s Board of Trustees approved a 3.65 percent, or $2,020 increase, in tuition for the 2017-18 academic year, bringing total yearly tuition costs to $52,500. The university, though, also increased undergraduate financial aid by 5.8 percent, outpacing the increase in tuition and fees.

Northwestern University set their 2017-18 tuition at $52,239, an increase of 3.6 percent from the previous year. Room and board rates will also increase by the same amount there.

“Generally the increases are relatively small and incremental,” Heller said. “It’s unusual for a university to pull out an amount of this size and to designate it for a particular purpose.”

Kelchen also said SU’s tuition premium is unusual.

“To announce this sort of an increase and to push the sticker price of tuition over $50,000 a year is substantial,” Kelchen said.

Other universities have implemented similar initiatives that linked tuition increases to a specific program.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison launched an initiative in 2009 as a multi-year program to improve aspects of the university. It was funded by a tuition increase. The tuition increase raised $10 million the first year of the initiative’s implementation, $20 million the second year, $30 million the third year and $40 million the fourth year. Each year after that, with a rebase, $40 million was raised by the university.

Invest Syracuse will be funded by $40 million in fundraising, $30 million in administrative spending cuts and about $30 million with the new tuition premium, according to the university.

The tuition increase at UW-Madison was gradual. In-state students were charged an additional $250 each year for four years. Out-of-state students were charged $750. SU, on the other hand, is raising tuition by $3,300 all at once. Half of the funds from the UW-Madison initiative went to the university’s need-based aid pool, according to a Madison Initiative for Undergraduates graphic.

Increasing affordability and accessibility for talented, underrepresented students through financial aid and scholarships is a core component of Invest Syracuse, according to the university. Preston Cooper, a research analyst in higher education policy at the nonpartisan American Enterprise Institute, said accessibility will depend on whether or not scholarships and financial aid can offset the increase in tuition.

SU has pledged to raise $40 million in the next two years in a philanthropic campaign to support student scholarships. The university will also look to rebalance student grants and loans, in an effort to help students graduate with less debt.

But the tuition increase could still possibly dissuade students from attending the university, Cooper said.

“When the price of something goes up, people are going to demand less of it,” Cooper said. “I don’t think higher education is exempt from that.”

But with SU’s current tuition, “price-sensitive” students may not even be looking at the university as is, Kelchen said.

“When the sticker price is already close to $50,000 a year, I think people who are already very price-sensitive have ruled Syracuse out,” Kelchen said.

According to Business Insider, very few students pay the full sticker price at private universities such as SU. Most students will pay the net price, which is the sticker price subtracted by the amount of scholarships and financial aid. The average net price of tuition at SU is $28,000, according to the Invest Syracuse website.

Every university will reevaluate their tuition base yearly and determine how much to increase or decrease tuition, but for SU to increase tuition by $3,300 is surprising, Heller said.

Experts said that while the amount of SU’s rebase might be unusual, several universities have increased or added required fees in order to avoid raising tuition directly. Revenue goes to the same place, similar to a normal tuition increase, Cooper said.

“I think it is pretty common for a university to get around calling it a ‘tuition increase’ by calling it something else, or linking it to a particular program or mandatory fee,” Cooper said.

Published on January 25, 2018 at 12:43 am