Tuition for resident and nonresident undergraduates at UW System schools will increase by 5.5 percent in the 2007-08 school year, the UW Board of Regents decided Aug. 7.
UW System President Kevin Reilly said the decision, which marks the lowest percentage of tuition increase students have seen in seven years, was made in the 11th hour,"" and tuition bills were finally mailed out Aug. 24.
According to Charles Pruitt, vice president of the Regents, the increase will put more money toward the salaries of UW faculty and staff.
As a result, it will help to eventually close the widening gap between the smaller salaries of UW faculty and larger salaries of faculty at similar caliber schools around the country.
Pruitt said this is an important goal of the tuition increase decision because it will combat UW's growing problem of retaining and attracting faculty.
""UW-Madison's [tuition] will continue to be the second lowest tuition in the Big Ten,"" Pruitt said. The University of Iowa currently has the lowest tuition in the Big Ten.
Annual tuition will increase $330 at UW-Madison for resident undergrads, $323 at UW-Milwaukee, $251 at other four-year UW campuses and will stay the same at two-year UW campuses, according to Reilly. Tuition will increase $580 for UW-Madison nonresident undergrads as well.
However, UW-Madison senior and the Regent's student representative Colleene Thomas was one of three who voted against the increase.
""I don't think that students necessarily should be solely responsible for guaranteeing the quality of their university by securing the proper payment for their professors,"" Thomas said.
She added that she has been encouraging Wisconsin residents to call or write to state representatives to give student perspectives on funding and tuition.
With the state biennial budget for 2007-'09 yet to be decided in the state Legislature, tuition could change again in January for the spring semester if the actual budget passed differs from the Board's prediction.
Despite student protests against higher tuition, Reilly stressed the need to find ""that extra couple hundred bucks"" because ""it's such a wise investment in your own life that it's foolish not to make it.
