Tuesday, November 12, 1996
FEES:
Chancellor Young supports mandatory course, technology feesBy
Brooke Olson
Daily Bruin Staff
When Chancellor Charles Young attended UCLA in the late 1950s,
registration fees were nearly nonexistent. California residents at
that time never worried about paying fees; their expenses consisted
mainly of textbooks and housing.
Nearly 40 years later, students are not only being desiccated by
a possible 10 percent fee increase, but are also threatened with
the possible implementation of technology and course fees.
The 1997-98 proposed budget for current UC operations contains a
provision for a $330 increase in the current mandatory University
wide fees.
In addition, a new mandatory Instructional Technology Fee of $40
is recommended for implementation beginning in 1997-98 to boost the
informational technologies available to UC students.
The proposed Instructional Technology Fee would be phased in
over three to four years to reach approximately $200 a year when
fully implemented.
Closer to home, the UCLA administration  under the
guidance of Chancellor Young  will allow departments to set
mandatory course fees which will require students to pay a certain
amount of money for each class taken.
"It’s ridiculous  all of these different charges on the
students," said John Du, president of the undergraduate council.
"The administration is just trying to find the sneakiest ways to
milk the students for more money.
"Students are the easiest target  we can provide a steady
amount of income for the university," Du added.
But administrators said fee hikes are necessary to augment
declining state revenue  more than $400 million in the last
four years  to the University.
In addition to the budget cuts, spiraling inflations caused
cost-of-living faculty salary increase to be put on hold for three
years.
"We need more money," said Young, a longtime proponent of higher
student fees. "At some point you reach a point where tuition
increases are no longer feasible. In my view we are far below that
(point)."
As state support plummeted to nearly 25 percent over the last
three years, the administration turned to the governor’s office for
a solution to the university’s fiscal shortages.
In 1995, Gov. Pete Wilson signed a "compact" with the University
calling for the UCs to receive state-funded increases of 4 percent
per year, while at the same time raising student fees 10 percent
each year.
For the last two years, the state has "bought out" proposed fee
hikes, thereby preventing a student registration fee increase.
Whether this "buy out" will take place next year is unknown
because state revenue for this year has not been calculated, said
California Department of Finance spokesman H.D. Palmer.
"The governor will have the option to make certain expenditures
once the final revenue has been totaled," Palmer said. "This can
include buying out the fee hike."
But, according to several UCLA sources, the UC administration is
considering asking the state to buy out only part of the fee
increase.
"The administration would like to see the money that would’ve
gone to buying out the fee increases to be spent elsewhere in the
university system  such as building upkeep and research,"
said associate vice chancellor John E. Kobara.
UC Budget Director Larry Hershman indicated to the regents last
month that the university had other priorities than just
eliminating the fee hike, said members of the Board of Regents.
These priorities include raising faculty salaries and expanding
outreach programs.
The UC system is also proposing an Instructional Technology Fee
to fund projects that benefit students by providing them with
access to state-of-the-art technology.
Students are asked to pay a "modest" fee which university
administrators plan to raise to $200 within the next few years.
However some students feel that "instruction" should be paid for
by the university. Under the 1960 California Master Plan for
Education, the legislature noted that students would not be
required to pay for instruction.
"Technology is instruction," Du said. "The administration is
breaking their promise to the Master Plan.
"It troubles me as a student to see such disregard for the truth
in these documents," he added.
But administrators contend that the fee is necessary to increase
the amount of software and hardware available to the students. This
includes providing greater access to the Internet, digitized local
library collections and instructional facilities to meet the needs
of the disabled.
"We have made great strides in providing our students access to
technology; but we need to do more. And to do more is expensive,"
said UC President Richard Atkinson in an October message to the
Regents.
But the UC system isn’t the only group planning to levy
additional fees on students. UCLA will also implement mandatory
course fees within the next few years.
To a certain extent, course fees already exist in the form of
lab fees that provide the students with additional materials.
However, because mandatory course fees within the UCs were
illegal, the lab fees were optional. Students could purchase the
materials from a different source.
But, when UCLA discovered four UC campuses charging mandatory
course fees, the administrators succeeded in lobbying the Office of
the President to change the policy.
"At this point, there is a 100 percent certainty that these fees
will go through," said Lynn Swartz, chair of the Student Fee
Advisory Committee (SFAC). "The theory is that the students are
supposed to share a portion of material costs."
The fees shall not exceed the cost of a regular textbook Â
which can range anywhere from $30 to over $100, SFAC members
said.
Departments will use the money to purchase materials or products
germane to the classes.
"There is no incentive to charge the fees, but obviously each
department will want to obtain as much money as possible," Swartz
said.
Currently, a committee  composed of students and
administrators, including the deans of the four divisions  is
drafting up a plan to allow departments the option of initiating
the course material fees.
But some fear that the fees will not directly benefit students
but instead give departments the opportunity to receive even more
money.
"I think (the university) is facing an avalanche of fees and
they are being imposed with very little thought and few checks and
balances," said Student Regent Jess Bravin.
But administrators contend that the course material fees will be
used to pay for only those services which aid students.
In addition, any department which wants to establish a course
fee must get the approval of SFAC Â an advisory board composed
of undergraduate and graduate students.
Despite the university’s reassurances, some wonder what effect
the rising cost of education will have on not only the students,
but also the economy.
"The more you have to raise fees, the more you have to shut out
students," Du said.
"That cripples economy because California won’t have readily
available highly-educated people to control our industries
anymore."
Students concerned about the course fees may e-mail their
suggestions to Lynn Swartz at swartz@humnet. ucla.edu.