As Boston University students were enjoying their spring breaks — whether they were tanning on beaches, exploring foreign cities or relaxing at home — an email arrived in the inboxes of returning students on Friday, directly from Office of the President, to dim the much-needed reprieve.
President Robert Brown released the news that tuition and mandatory fees will total $67,352 for the 2017-2018 academic year. This marks a 3.4 percent increase, consisting of increases for both tuition and room and board. This amount, however, only applies to the lowest cost of on-campus housing. For those looking to live in Student Village, a South Campus apartment or in a single room, the cost will be greater.
Some students are angry and disheartened to see the increase. What is even more upsetting is that the direct placement of our tuition is unclear. Brown wrote in the email that tuition increases most directly come from the need for “competitive increases in salaries and benefits, continued investment in our academic programs, and the costs associated with operating and updating our facilities.”
However, this is not a good enough explanation for students and parents who must now spend even more money for education. The main problem is that students don’t know what or who they’re tuition is going toward. When your university’s president is one of the highest paid presidents in the country, it’s questionable to see a bigger bill shoved in your face. Students have the right to know what specifically their money is being spent on. Yes, BU is constantly constructing and renovating buildings to improve the university, but many of the projects are funded by individuals or through our endowment. As the university proudly announced that it has received the record-high amount of donations in 2016, why are we now paying even more when the university brought in that much money? Students who invest their future in the university deserves greater transparency on how exactly the university is improving their education.
Paying for college tuition means much more than just a transaction. While students who come to BU to learn are not merely customers who pay for a certain “product,” it seems the university is treating education more and more like a business. The university has given us vague phrasing in shiny coating, disappointing those who want more information from the administration. But even if we truly are customers, then we have a right to know what we’re paying for.
One of the biggest reasons for tuition increase is to raise salaries and benefits of university employees in order to incentivize them to stay at BU. As a tuition-based school, BU relies on our money to fill out paychecks even with donations and the current size of our endowment. And while it’s understandable that BU is spending student tuition to pay for the raise, especially when our reputation isn’t prestigious enough to garner an endowment that can cover all faculty and staff salaries, it is also reasonable to hope part of our tuition goes toward improving the treatment towards adjunct professors and lecturers, whose main focus is teaching students, and they often have real world experience that is invaluable in the classroom.
For a liberal school that stresses the importance of education, this recent statement makes BU the epitome of what liberals are against. Roughly $67,000 a year creates a huge barrier between those in the top 2 percent and the rest of our student body. The Daily Free Press reported earlier this semester that one in 10 students comes from the top one percent of U.S. families. That is an incredibly jarring statistic. It proves that our tuition is already so high that those who pay full price must be extremely wealthy, and those who can’t must be receiving a generous amount of financial aid. BU also “guaranteed” financial aid, claiming that grants or scholarships awarded last year will not lower from this point forward. However, they didn’t assure that financial aid would increase either. Private universities do not have the same oversight as public universities, but students still have the right to more than this opaque transparency.
Students should know the amount they will pay each year before they agree to commit to a university for four years. In fact, several universities across the country have fixed tuition, where a student will pay the same tuition for all four years of their college career. This would create less of a burden and a higher degree of certainty for less privileged students. It’s simply unfair to surprise the student body each year with a bigger bill, although tuition increases are unfortunately to be expected. Students should have the right to know what their tuition will be by the time of their graduation, even if it is only an estimate. A university shouldn’t allow students to drop out because they can no longer afford the skyrocketing rates after already completing several semesters.
BU is essentially acting as a corporation, taking advantage of students and employees, in opposition of many of what they stress to students and what embodies current liberal education philosophy.
