Adds Extra 2.5 Percent Increase for Students Using Credit Cards
By Matt Clyburn
The Connecticut State University System Board of Trustees approved a 2.5 percent increase in tuition and fees for more than 36,000 students last Thursday, along with a new credit card transaction fee that will impose an additional 2.5 percent for student using a card to pay their bill.
The credit card transaction fee was a last-minute addition to the board’s proposed changes and aligns to similar fees charged at other local institutions of higher education, including UConn.
According to the Hartford Courant, officials estimated that nearly 40 percent of CSUS students use credit cards for payment, in whole or in part.
Students also have the option to enroll in the CENTRAL Payment Plan for a $35 fee, which allows payers to divide the cost of attendance into five equal monthly payments.
It is unclear whether students using credit card-branded debit cards would be charged the fee, but students may use an ‘e-check’ to have payment drawn electronically from any bank account. CCSU students may also use a personal check, money order, cashier’s check or a Blue Chip debit account to make payment of tuition and fees.
A press release from the CSUS said that the increase is the smallest since 2000, but follows a vote by the board in September 2010 that indicated tuition would be frozen for next year.
“It is important that CSUS maintain the accessibility and affordability of its universities to the greatest extent possible,” said Angelo Messina, chairman of the Finance and Administration Committee, in September. “Our students and potential students are among those that are most affected by the prolonged economic downturn.”
Tuition and fees will increase by an average of $198 for in-state undergraduate commuters and $446 for in-state undergraduates that living on campus, according to a press release from the system. Exact rates will vary based on university, course schedule and additional program requirements.
Another change approved by the board Thursday will add a lab fee for nursing students to provide required materials during non-lecture course sessions.
Board Vice Chairman Richard J. Balducci echoed Governor Dannel Malloy’s recent call for shared sacrifice and said that cost-cutting measures are being implemented across the system to keep the tuition increase at 2.5 percent.
The governor asked Connecticut public universities and colleges earlier this year not to raise tuition by more than the level of inflation. Since the request, state officials have pegged the rate of inflation at 2.5 percent and the University of Connecticut trustees voted a tuition increase at precisely that rate just a few weeks ago.
The system-wide tuition increase last year was 6.3 percent for in-state undergraduate commuters and 5.6 percent for in-state undergraduate campus residents.
“Currently, the cost of tuition and fees falls about midway compared with public universities in the Northeast, and is the lowest when compared with 11 competitor universities in the region which CSUS students had considered attending,” the CSUS statement said.
