The University of Akron will raise tuition, housing, dining and parking rates for the fall, as well as other fees, even as members of the Board of Trustees delayed approving their budget until September because of financial concerns, including uncertainty about next year’s enrollment figures.
The tuition increase would cost full-time students registered for 12 credit hours an additional $191.28 per semester. Other fee increases will raise costs by hundreds more for those who eat, sleep or park on campus.
While the board was slated to approve the budget for the coming year on Wednesday, members instead agreed to give the university temporary spending authority through the end of September in the hope that enrollment figures will stabilize in the coming months.
The approvals came weeks into the term of a new university president, R.J. Nemer. Nemer, the former business school dean, took the helm last month following Gary Miller’s abrupt retirement.
The temporary budget agreement comes because current financial conditions and a delay in the availability of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, which helps determine financial aid rewards, “have complicated the University’s ability to closely predict fiscal year 2024-2025 revenues and expenditures,” according to a resolution to approve the temporary budget.
It also said student recruitment and other initiatives remain underway.
“The University believes the level of fiscal predictability will increase as the fall 2024 semester approaches,” the resolution stated, “particularly when enrollment and the resultant state share of instruction will be better known.”
The university did not make anyone available to answer questions about its decision to move forward with a temporary spending resolution. In a May statement, Steve McKellips, the university’s vice provost for enrollment management, said he didn’t expect to have a firm understanding of what enrollment might look like until mid-June.
The university pushed its deadline for students to say they were coming to the University of Akron from May 1 back to June 1, as did other colleges and universities across the country that were dealing with federal FAFSA delays.
“Fortunately, financial aid packages have hit the mail, but we still expect families to collect the material from their interested institutions and take a few weeks to make their final decisions,” McKellips said in a May 9 message. “At this point, our traditional May 1 understanding of where we are has been deferred for another three weeks at least.”
Ensuring day-to-day function
The temporary, three-month budget approved by trustees provides for $40.2 million in compensation from the general fund and total expenditures of $65.6 million for the period. It lays out operating, utilities, scholarship, debt service and other costs across the general fund, auxiliary fund and a fund for departmental sales and service.
The temporary budget does not account for any revenues coming into the university.
Last month, university trustees agreed to take “all steps necessary … to substantially reduce the university’s budget challenges in the next two fiscal years” in a resolution they passed acknowledging the university’s “significant financial challenges, which if left unaddressed, threaten to undo all of the positive changes that have occurred.”
Since then, the university has undergone a presidential transition. In his first board meeting as the new University of Akron president, Nemer thanked board members for supporting him as he continued to “listen and learn” about the university’s governance. He said he wanted to ensure students remain at the forefront of the university.
Interim Chief Financial Officer Misty Villers said the university should have a better understanding in September of what enrollment might look like. Until then, she and others will “thoughtfully and strategically” look at the university’s finances to set the school up for success, Villers said.
The temporary spending authority, which board members approved without discussion, will allow the university to function day-to-day, she said.
At UA, costs go up
At the same meeting, trustees approved a number of increases in the cost of attending the university.
The tuition hike will cost students almost $16 more per credit hour, an increase of 3%. The per-credit-hour cost will rise to $547.42 for tuition and fees. That will also be the rate for the students in the 2024-2025 tuition guarantee program, which freezes tuition, room and board rates, along with some fees, for four years.
For the university’s regional campuses, the per-credit increase of less than $10 also marks a 3% change. Each credit will cost $321.79 next year, following approval Wednesday by the Board of Trustees. The tuition guarantee program will also be applicable to those regional campus rates.
Housing rates, which will rise by 5.6% across the board, are still below what they were before the coronavirus pandemic, according to university figures. The median housing price for 2024-2025 will be $3,125 a semester, an increase of $165. A comparable housing accommodation was $4,228 before the pandemic, according to the university.
On the high end, Exchange Apartments will cost $3,700, or $195 more a semester. On the low end, double rooms in Bulger, Orr and Spanton will cost $2,635, or $141 more a semester. The apartments were $5,007 a semester before the pandemic, while the double rooms previously cost $3,563.
The university is discussing the possibility of privatizing its housing, but no decision has been made yet.
Dining rates are also going up 5.3%, with prices rising anywhere from $5 a semester for faculty/staff cafeteria access plus a handful of swipes for guests, to $143 a semester for the university’s gold dining plan. That plan will now cost $2,843 each semester.
Parking costs are also scheduled to rise, with more increases expected to come each year through the 2027-2028 academic year. The university has already privatized its parking.
Beginning in the fall, student permits and overnight parking permits for students will rise 5%, though students who were in a tuition guarantee program prior to fall 2023 will be excluded from the increase. Each semester, the cost of a student permit will be $236, an $11 increase. An overnight parking upgrade will cost $81, an additional $4 per semester.
For employees, parking rates will rise 16% — an annual parking pass for the academic year will cost $348, an increase of $48 per year. A reserved permit, for $659, will cost $19 more, or 3% higher. And emeritus/retiree employees, who had previously parked for free, will now pay $126 a year for a parking permit.
One-day parking passes will go from $10 to $10.50, a 5% increase. Hourly parking rates will more than double, to $2.25 an hour from $1 an hour.
Over the coming years, parking rates are likely to continue to rise, though the board only passed the rates for the academic year beginning in the fall. Student permits are slated to go up to $248 a semester for the 2025-2026 academic year, followed by increases to $260 a semester, then $273 a semester. Overnight upgrades are scheduled to keep rising by $4 a year.
And employee permits are likely to go up to $404 for the 2025-2026 academic year, then $469, followed by $543 for the 2027-2028 year. Those rates were not yet approved by the board.
Other increases come in the form of a new general service fee for graduate, law and non-degree students; the change in guest pass rates for the student recreation and wellness center; and new fees to use the student union or conference space. Additionally, setup fees for the use of such spaces will double, to $50, and per-hour fees for the rooms will rise to $30, a $5-an-hour increase.
The university also raised fees for access to its human performance lab and increased other rates for on-campus activities.
The school did not make anyone available to talk about the changes after the vote.
Prior to the vote, trustees received a financial report for the first 10 months of the year that said the university was running a $27 million deficit. Expenses, Villers said, are running $2.7 million over budget. And the university has $10.3 million in debt service payments this year, as losses are expected to approach $20 million.