California State Universities like UC Davis and California State Colleges like CSU Sacramento have nearly doubled their tuition fees over the last six years, making it harder for students to afford a higher education.
Last month officials from both the UC and CSU systems met to discuss increasing student fees. Both system boards decided to raise their fees for the 2007-2008 academic year. California State Universities will raise fees 10 percent while Universities of California will increase fees by 7 percent.
These percentages in dollars equal an additional $252 for CSU undergraduates and an additional $435 for UC Undergraduates. Graduate students are also affected by these percentage increases. The cost of attending a CSU for one year after the increase comes to roughly $3,451 and for a UC the total comes to about $7,347. These amounts do not include books, housing, campus fees or any other additional costs of attending college.
For example, the current cost of tuition fees for one year at UC Davis is $8,323, and would increase by $435 next year. CSU Chico charges its students $3,402 and CSU Sacramento charges $3,280. Both universities would augment their fees by $252 next year.
You must add approximately $14,000 more to that amount for books and supplies, food and housing, transportation and miscellaneous costs of living to arrive at the total for one year at a university in California.
Fees for California’s public universities have risen five times in the last 6 years. Last year, a fee increase was proposed by the school boards but was later removed in the final state budget. Even so, the costs of remain a concern to students.
“I had to move back in with my aunt and uncle,” Cal State Fullerton junior Angel Meyers said. “I was living on my own, but at the end of last semester, I had to move back in with my family. Now they want to raise fees 10 percent more.”
California Community College students are used to low fees, and many remain unaware of the trend of increasing costs of attending a four-year college. California community college fees remain the lowest in the nation at $20 per unit.
“I had planned on attending San Diego State after completing my transfer requirements, but if it is too expensive, I may have to move back home and go to Sac State,” Kim Bailey, a Woodland Community College student, said.
Despite student concern, California education officials insist that the state’s public four-year colleges are among the least expensive in the nation and that many of the students
Comment Policy: Comments are welcomed and encouraged. However, the editorial board reserves the right to edit or delete, without notice, any comments submitted to the blog. For more details, see our full Comment Policy.