Tuition hikes may price many out of college
George Mason University begins fall classes Aug. 21, while Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia start next week.
A few days before graduating its largest class in history this year, GMU announced a 10-percent increase in tuition and fees for 2008-09. That translates to an increase of $7,512 a year for in-state students and a whopping $21,648 more for those who do not live in Virginia.
The news wasn't any better at Virginia Tech, where tuition and fees will jump by nearly 11 percent for the 2008-09 academic year. The University of Virginia bumped up costs by 9 percent for in-state students.
For those keeping score, the average cost of a four-year education in Virginia has more than doubled in the past decade.
Officials at all three schools say the increases are necessary because of state budget cuts.
While we understand the need to tighten belts in soft economic times, shifting so much of the financial burden of a college education from the state to the students seems a tad unfair and more than a little unwise.
It's fair to say Virginia schools are pricing many students from low- and middle-income families out of college at a time when education is an increasingly important ticket to good jobs. The pool of scholarship money is shrinking, which only compounds the problem. And we worry that this situation may have a disproportionate impact on minority students.
If even a small percentage of young students in Virginia start to believe that getting a high school degree is a waste of time because they can't afford a public four-year college anyway, there may be ripple effects all the way down to the middle school classrooms.
It's still a bit early to call this a crisis, but university presidents and state lawmakers need to hatch a plan that doesn't put the family of every college-bound student in a state of financial disrepair.
If they don't, higher education in Virginia will have gone from being a good deal to a cautionary tale.