Tuition, fees on NIC trustees’ agenda
Tuition and fees at North Idaho College are among the most affordable in the region, a point that the college administration will make as trustees meet today to consider a possible increase for the next school year.
Tonight’s board meeting will include a discussion of tuition and fees, faculty and staff salaries, and the Associated Students of NIC’s desire for a recreation center on campus.
Although the college has increased tuition and fees significantly in the past three years – from an 8 percent increase last year and nearly 10 percent increases the two years prior – the community college still is more affordable than any other college in the Inland Northwest, according to figures gathered by NIC.
This year’s in-state tuition and fees were $916 a semester, compared with $928 in-state fees for Spokane’s community colleges and $1,816 a semester at the University of Idaho. Less expensive are the College of Southern Idaho in Twin Falls, at $900 a semester, and Flathead Valley Community College in Kalispell, Mont., at $637 a semester.
A desire to bring staff and faculty salaries up to par with comparable colleges and the NIC students’ wish for a recreation center could lead trustees to approve another large increase in tuition and fees next year, but the NIC staff has not made any particular recommendation to the Board of Trustees.
“I know there’s some hesitation to raise tuition that much again,” said Rolly Jurgens, NIC vice president for administrative services. “There’s hesitation on the part of the students.”
The faculty is hesitant, too, although it also wants the college to continue to bring salaries on par with other colleges, said Susanne Bromley, chairwoman of the NIC Faculty Assembly.
“I have a great sensitivity to the students. They’ve had a dramatically high increase in tuition and fees in the last few years,” Bromley said. “It does take greater revenue to run a growing institution.”
The trustees have made a verbal commitment to increase salary ranges to the 50th percentile of comparable schools, Jurgens said. Last year, the board agreed to a 7 percent increase in overall salaries, but that didn’t bring everyone’s salary to the comparable level.
To meet the salary goal, the college would need to increase salaries another 6 percent to 8 percent in the coming year, Jurgens said, which would cost the college at least $1 million.
Even then, it might not be quite enough to catch up, Bromley said. “The problem seems to be we’re shooting a moving target. We go up, but so do all our comparator schools.”
The college is expecting to get about $1 million from a combination of new revenues: increases in property tax revenue, student enrollment, the state general fund and other sources. But the college will have increased expenses, too, including $173,000 to operate the new health sciences building and enough money to potentially hire another half-dozen positions for other programs.
And if students are granted their wish for a recreation center, that could lead to an increase in student fees, which would boost the overall cost of attending the college, too.
“You can’t do everything. Not very easily, anyway,” Jurgens said.
Tonight’s board meeting will explore the different options and a final decision on any increase is expected at April’s board meeting.