Training:
Talking Points About 2008-2009 Undergraduate Tuition and Fee Increases
Please do not read these to students; use them for your own background and understanding.
Note that VU is a “Direct Loan” school with the government, so all the loan shifts you read about and the problems you hear about with college loans do not apply to VU; they apply to schools that are NOT directly linked to the government loan programs.
{Audiences: Prospective and Current Students, Parents, Alumni, Media}
Undergraduate Tuition …..... $26,070
General Fee ……….……..… $880
Freshman Board ……….….. $2,940
Room …………….….……. $4,680
TOTAL …………….….….. $34,570
Students enrolled in the College of Engineering pay an additional $700 fee that is unchanged from 2007-2008.
• Valpo's tuition increase of 7% is slightly higher than the 5+% typical in recent years. While this level of increase is necessary, note that the difference between a 5% increase and a 7% increase over tuition for the current year is less than $500.
• VU remains committed to holding increases to the lowest possible level without compromising the quality of the education.
• The comprehensive fee for most students living and eating on campus will increase by less than 7 percent. Board rates are changing to reflect higher costs of operation; room rates will continue to vary by residential unit.
• Costs of operation continue to rise and additional revenue is required to maintain our current level of excellence.
• The increase is needed to help fund additional programming in the new Union that will open next year.
• Costs of operating an institution of higher education differ from the costs of living we see in our homes. For example, more than half of our expenditures are related to personnel so even a modest salary increase for employees requires significant revenue, and increases in health care costs are especially burdensome. The ongoing need for new technology and the supporting infrastructure also comes at a high cost. Unfunded government mandates add to budget pressures.
• It's important that we remain competitive with salaries so we can continue to provide excellent classroom teachers. We have a reputation for a high quality academic program and we want to continue to build on that reputation.
• We continue efforts to slow the growth in operating costs. For example, we are reducing the size of service vehicles to save on fuel and maintenance expenses; we have reorganized service staff for improved efficiency; we installed higher efficiency boilers in several buildings as part of numerous efforts designed to curtail energy use; and we joined purchasing groups to achieve better pricing on various goods.
• While we must maintain our current level of excellence, our goal is to continually improve it. Evidence for Valpo includes:
• Ranked among “America's Best Colleges” by U.S. News & World Report for 19 consecutive years and featured as one of “The Best 366 Colleges” (in the U.S.) by Princeton Review .
• Classroom instruction by a talented faculty that includes the Indiana Professor of the Year, the Indiana French Teacher of the Year, an appointee to the American School Health Association task force exploring the future of school health, faculty who were honored for authoring the best paper in their discipline, faculty that involve students in ground-breaking research (e.g., a student in biochemistry helped make a key discovery in a class of proteins; another was invited to make presentations at two major professional conferences—a rare honor for a student), and faculty that are invited to make presentations and serve as consultants throughout the world.
• Valpo is among the nation's leaders in producing winners of prestigious Fulbright awards for three of the past four years.
• Valpo is the first faith-based university in the U.S. selected to host a Confucius Institute.
• VU's commitment to international studies is cited as an exemplary program by NAFSA: Assoc. of International Educators.
• Valpo continues to expand its academic programs, including a recently established exchange program with a university in suburban Paris. (We have four Study Centers and a total of 13 study abroad options.)
• A team of accounting students finished second in the Indiana CPA Society Case Competition after gaining a berth in the finals for the seventh time in eight years.
• Students have the opportunity for hands-on learning such as participation in a launch of high altitude balloons as part of a demonstration of emergency communications network capabilities and to participate in a project to identify ways to store and transport solar energy.
• Although we are a not-for-profit institution, we cannot be a for-loss institution and we must have a balanced budget to operate on a sound fiscal basis. Revenue comes primarily from three sources: endowment, gifts, and tuition.
• Endowment – these are funds invested by the University from which the income can be used for purposes specified by the donors. The principal cannot be spent. We will continue to build our endowment, especially seeking creation of endowment funds that will provide budget relief (e.g. funding for faculty development, student financial aid).
• Gifts – Alumni and friends continue to be generous donors to the University and we are asking them for additional support. Although unrestricted gifts that directly support the operating budget have increased steadily, it's never been at the rate needed to offset the increasing cost of goods and services required. In addition to appeals to individuals, we actively seek grants from other sources, including state and federal grants that support student and faculty scholarship. (Note that gifts to construct buildings are made expressly for that purpose; such construction is not funded out of the operating budget.)
• Tuition – While we work to increase revenue from the first two sources, we must ask families to share in enabling us to assure continuation of the excellence that has characterized Valpo.
• Even students who receive no scholarships or grants pay only about two-thirds of the cost of a Valpo education. Students receiving financial assistance pay even less. The other third comes from gifts, special grants and earnings from investments. There are continuous efforts to increase revenue from these sources to keep tuition increases as small as possible.
• Valpo's comprehensive cost of tuition, room and board for 2007-2008 is comparable with the national average for four-year, private residential institutions ($32,350 at Valpo vs. $32,307 nationally); compared to institutions of Valpo's quality, Valparaiso University continues to be a bargain. We do not expect our comparative position in costs to change significantly.
• Last spring, Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine named Valpo one of the top 50 educational values among the nation's private institutions of higher education.
• Valpo consistently has been rated a “best value” by U.S. News & World Report magazine (first or second for 6 successive years until last fall when we were not ranked because the magazine failed to contact us for our information).
• A good education is, after all, an investment that pays dividends for a lifetime. It is not a perishable commodity.
• VU graduates attract employers (95% placement for the last three years) and we receive regular reports about honors and promotions, indicating alumni are very successful. Employers and grad schools filled all spots at the Career Fair.
• Studies continue to show that lifetime earnings of a college graduate exceed those of a high school graduate by more than 60 percent. The gap is large enough for the average college graduate to recover both earnings lost during the college years and the cost of tuition and fees in a relatively short period of time. (From a report, Education Pays 2007: The Benefits of Higher Education for Individuals and Society, published by the College Board.)
• And, the economic factors don't address the fact that college graduates enjoy a higher quality of life, are better prepared to adjust to changes in their careers, etc.
• A more educated citizenry means decreased demands on public budgets and increased participation in civic activities.