Missouri tuition hike could mean prestige boost

Friday, January 14, 2011

COLUMBIA (AP) — University of Missouri officials suggested Friday that an expected tuition increase will do more than just plug holes in campus budgets weakened by years of declining state support — it will boost the school’s reputation.

Some out-of-state students and parents who equate a college’s price tag with academic excellence could see the increased cost as a reflection of the university’s prestige, they said.

“It’s not just price,” said Warren Erdman, a Kansas City lawyer and chairman of the university system’s Board of Curators. “It’s also a brand perception.”

Curators held a video teleconference Friday morning to discuss campus finances in advance of a late January meeting in Columbia, where they plan to increase tuition for the first time in three years.

The exact amount of the fee hike won’t be determined until Gov. Jay Nixon releases his proposed budget next week. School officials hope to keep the increase below 10 percent.

Undergraduate students from Missouri and take a standard 15-credit course load now pay $3,684 in tuition each semester, while out-of-state students pay $6,008. A 9 percent increase would translate into a $332 boost per semester for in-state students and a $541 hike for out-of-state undergraduates. Those amounts don’t include required student fees.

Proposed fee increases range from 1 percent to 3 percent at the Columbia and St. Louis campuses to 6.5 percent at Missouri University of Science and Technology in Rolla. The proposed increases in room and board costs range from 2.8 percent at the Rolla campus to 8.3 percent at Missouri-St. Louis.

Chancellor Brady Deaton told curators that the Columbia campus could expect to enroll 200 more out-of-state students should tuition increase by 10 percent next year, with many of them likely coming from neighboring Illinois. Deaton didn’t say how he came to the 200-student figure, but noted that prospective students and their families often consider a costlier school to mean a better education.

Columbia, the flagship campus, typically recruits nearly as many students from Chicago as from Kansas City, Deaton said.

Tuition for the coming academic year is typically set in the spring. But university leaders want an early start because Missouri law requires a waiver from the state to raise tuition beyond the Consumer Price Index inflation rate, which is currently 1.5 percent.

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MK 2 years, 4 months ago

Wow, that's gotta be about the lamest selling point to a price increase that I've ever heard of. People will think you are getting more out of us because we are charging you more but in reality you aren't getting anything extra. This is coming from an institution of higher learning.

That's prestigious? Sounds really stupid to me.

I think I'll go out and buy a car for 18k next week and pass up on the same exact thing which I could buy at another location for 12k. Then I can go to work and brag to everyone about how special I am because I needlessly wasted 6k on something. Yep, real smart. Your aurora will glow bright amongst your peers.

herewego 2 years, 4 months ago

What else would you expect from a slick KC Lawyer (the head of the Curators), just plain double speak. He must have been a grad of one of the nations top party school (ole mizzou).