Many students at Indiana University of Pennsylvania are going to be hit with a big tuition increase this fall when the second-largest school in the State System of Higher Education starts charging by the credit rather than by the semester.
IUP floated this idea a year ago in a sneaky way, being less than upfront in what the change would mean to students. Although the actual charges won’t be set until summer, the change could mean an increase of about 16 percent for a typical student taking 15 credits per semester. IUP said the school will offer discounts, to be phased out over three years, to help students move from the flat-rate tuition plan, and it intends to offer more financial aid.
The price increase is not the only drawback of the per-credit method. It could reduce the incentive for students who had been able to load up on extra courses and graduate sooner without having to pay more than the set semester rate.
The change is expected to help plug IUP’s $15 million budget hole, staving off program and faculty cuts, but there’s no getting around the fact that it is Pennsylvania families who will be doing the heavy lifting.
That’s an unfortunate reality, and the state’s level of funding for higher education generally and the state system in particular is at least partially to blame. Like the state-related universities including Pitt and Penn State, the 14 state-owned schools received a 5 percent funding increase in the long-delayed 2015-16 budget. That helps, but it’s not enough to change Pennsylvania’s low ranking among the states in the amount it provides for its colleges and universities.
IUP officials have studied the charge-by-credit model and are confident that it can work as it has on another state campus, Millersville University of Pennsylvania. Critics counter that it will reduce access and affordability. That would be unfortunate since those qualities are fundamental to the state system.
Since IUP seems set on going in this direction, it is essential that the university start explaining the complexities of its pricing structure to its current, future and prospective students and their families.
First Published: March 31, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
