Placing bricks and mortar above education, West County representatives unite to pass another tuition increase to keep building blitz going
On March 1, 2016 the three-member voting block from the West side of Yavapai County voted to once again increase student tuition. The increase is necessary if the College is to continue its building blitz on the West side of the County, which takes up $8 million or more on average a year. The increase will be around $4 per credit hour.
Representatives Al Filardo and Deb McCasland, representing Verde Valley interests, voted against the proposal. Ms. McCasland argued there were many opportunities for the College to find ways to cut expenditures. Mr. Filardo questioned the efficacy of increasing tuition to pay for such things as increased salaries when enrollment was continuing to fall.
The College has increased tuition in some form every year for the past ten years—even during all of the recession. The College almost never talks about the fact that it has put in place a three-tier tuition fee structure; rather, it hypes a claim that student fees are $75 per credit hour per semester. Almost half of the enrolled students pay much higher fees—although the College has not released the exact percentage for obvious reasons. Tier 2 students pay $86 per credit hour; tier three students pay $96 per credit hour. Furthermore, there are a number of so-called “market tuition based” courses that charge from $105 to $161 per hour. Finally, some aviation courses charge as much as $662 an hour. Click here to see the 2016 in-state fee schedule.
No students spoke for or against the proposed increase.