Senators ignore reason in tuition vote
Last week, the student senate voted against tuition increases to support our university while, in the same meeting, voting to support an increase in student fees to support the Counseling Center.
This is the very definition of “knee jerk.”
The Counseling Center undoubtedly gives great services to the students who use it. But the University of Nevada, Reno, all of its students included, is under siege by a deflated budget.
Now is not the time to be concerned with benefiting one center.
Even before the state legislature voted Monday to cut another $4 million from all of Nevada higher education, this single university faced a staggering $31 million in budget cuts.
The UNR administration has said that they can’t bear any more cuts without slicing deep into the core of education. That, unfortunately, means we can’t be concerning ourselves so much with the Counseling Center. We should instead be concerning ourselves with saving our education as a whole.
What furthers the knee jerk argument is the context behind the senators’ votes. The senate meeting was a day before the Board of Regents, Nevada higher education’s governing body, planned to discuss potential tuition increases. The most recent news before that was Chancellor Jim Rogers’ admittedly absurd speculation about a 25 percent tuition increase.
Tuition increase is always a scary term. It would be understandable that Rogers’ proposal would compound that fear, if not for his team’s vocal admission that it was meant to be a headline-grabber.
By comparison, the senate’s vote for the Counseling Center came after the director of counseling services, Matthew Blusewicz, pleaded for their support of a $5 fee per student for the center.
It was an earnest plea and one that should have been acted on if not for the $31 million specter hovering above UNR. But it is a sad reality that governing bodies must sometimes vote with their heads instead of their hearts.
We, as students, owe it to this university to pay in as much as we are getting out. In tight times we will likely need to pay more.
It will probably hurt enrollment to do so, like the senators argued in the resolution. A tuition increase could also hurt first-generation and low-income student enrollment, two demographics that this public university should strive to support.
But given the alternatives — the deep, diploma-damaging cuts — tuition increase may be our only alternative.
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3 Responses to “Senators ignore reason in tuition vote”
This is so hypocritical. Last session the Sagebrush criticized the Senate for approving a pre-planned tuition increase that was approved by the Tuition and Fees committee, saying that the senate should always represent the students and not approve tuition increases. Now your saying that they should have? Even though the administration never even brought them a proposal? Mostly because the administration doesn’t agree with a tuition increase. The senate had good reason for passing this resolution, they were saying that if you don’t bring an actual business plan for what your going to do with the money, it shouldn’t be approved. I think it’s great that the senate actually said something about this very important issue. Would the Sagebrush rather they didn’t do anything? If they hadn’t passed anything you guys would have written an editorial about how “the senate stands by and lets students get taxed!”
As to the point about them approving one fee and not the other. The administration brought them a good business plan about why they needed this money. It was then discussed in committee for like two weeks before even going to senate. I would rather have my tuition increased and go to specific programs instead of just a random increase that isn’t aimed anywhere. At least with these types of fees there is transparency. And the counseling fee is just like health insurance at a work. If only the sick pay into the plan, it won’t work. For something like this to work, everyone has to pay. And you never know, you might need it one day…
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“This is so hypocritical. Last session the Sagebrush criticized the Senate for approving a pre-planned tuition increase that was approved by the Tuition and Fees committee, saying that the senate should always represent the students and not approve tuition increases. Now your saying that they should have?”
Different editor, different editorial style, Taylor…
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There is a strategy — you don’t want to come out supporting a tuition increase that we have absolutely no information about because that leaves the administration room to do anything that they want. If the administration comes to us with a comprehensive plan for a tuition increase, of course we will look at it and consider it just as the 75th session did. But we’re sending a message that we aren’t going to support blanket tuition increases. The administration is going to have to plead their case with us to get our support. We aren’t going to let students pay more for less. The counseling center fee was supported because we thought the increase in the fee was proportional to an increase in services for students. We discussed it for weeks in committee.
Basically, everything that Taylor said is accurate. I think the title of this article is misleading, this resolution was not without reason, in fact, quite the opposite.
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