Cars filled to the brim with hopeful new Vandals drive past bright green hills as they embark on their first year of college life. They arrive at the University of Idaho and eagerly unpack their bags, preparing for whatever college has in store for them. From Greek Life to the residence halls and off-campus housing, students learn what their time at UI will mean. While they adjust to their academic lives, students must similarly adjust to changes in UI’s General Education Budget in face of the $22 million deficit.

UI’s deficit has led to talks and changes in the university’s operating structure from outsourcing, enrolment, voluntary incentive programs and more.

“Our goal in doing the budget cuts is to make the university healthier and to do it in a way that has as little impact on students as possible. We want the University of Idaho experience to be as good or better than it is today,” Assistant Vice President for University Budget and Planning Trina Mahoney said.

Mahoney said she hopes changes to the budget have a minimal effect on students and hopes students don’t notice the changes. However, these changes will affect most everyone on campus.

“I mean obviously we should care because it affects all of us,” Associated Students University of Idaho President Jacob Lockhart said. “Do I think people should be worried about it on a daily basis? No, I mean I don’t think that students should be lying awake at night worrying if things are going to work out, because it will.”

While the deficit and changes to the general education budget can be hard to understand, this guide is aimed to help students, faculty and staff have a clearer understanding.

Tuition Freeze

UI — as well as Idaho State University, Boise State University and Lewis-Clark State College — is under a tuition freeze. The freeze is a temporary hold on tuition pricing, as well as student fees. Tuition and fees for academic year 2020-2021 will be the same price as academic year 2019-2020 for in-state, out-of-state, undergraduate and graduate students.

Self-support programs and professional fees will not be included in the freeze. UI’s self-support programs operate differently than normal undergraduate or graduate degrees. They are one to two-year programs that are specific to their track and do not require general education courses.

UI has five self-support programs including: the executive MBA program, a master’s in athletic training, a doctorate in athletic training, the environmental education and science communication academic graduate certificate and a master’s in natural resources.

The freeze is not a factor in the projected $22 million deficit, Mahoney said.

Student Fees

As a part of UI’s tuition freeze, student fees will not rise in academic year 2020-2021. In academic year 2019-2020, student fees totaled $1,061.10 and will not rise from that number.

“Even though technically it was just the tuition piece that got frozen, everyone kind of came to the conclusion and was like, ‘Well wait a minute. If a student or a parent sees that, they’re thinking that $4,500 isn’t going up.’ And then all of a sudden it goes up because we increase the mandatory fees. Then it feels like, ‘Oh it’s kind of like a bait and switch,’” Mahoney said. “…So, I believe all the institutions at this point have decided, ‘OK, it’s actually tuition and a (student fee) freeze.’”

The student fees help pay for facilities, activity and technology on campus. Jacob Lockhart, ASUI President, said that the activity fee is something that touches every aspect of student life.

“I don’t know if I can think of something on this campus outside of academia, that isn’t touched directly by the dedicated student activity fee,” Lockhart said.

Professional Fees

Professional fees are different than student fees. These fees are subject
to change despite the tuition freeze and are specific to the College of Art and Architecture (CAA) and College of Law.

Professional fees for the College of Art and Architecture (CAA) currently total $675 per semester for full-time students. Part-time undergraduate students pay a professional fee of $68 per credit, and part-time graduate students pay $75 per credit. These funds pay for things in the CAA
like accreditation fees, field trips/ traveling, maintaining and upgrading the Technical Design Studio, other studios and computer studios, upgrading computer software, and maintaining the Student Design Center.

“It also provides operational funds for the programs, because where we are different than some of the other colleges, we don’t have general education operational funds. All of our general education money just pays for salaries. Not everybody’s (salaries), but a majority of our faculty and staff,” said CAA Director of Administrative and Fiscal Operations Kimberly Osborne.

The professional fees pay for positions like the tech shop director, the technology assistant, temporary faculty and teaching assistants. Professional fees also pay for fringe benefits, Osborne said.

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In the past, CAA has mirrored its professional fee increase based on tuition fee increases. This year with the tuition freeze, however, the college is proposing a 3% increase to professional fees instead of freezing them with the tuition. If the fee increase is approved by the Idaho State Board of Education, the new fees will be implemented in the fall semester, Osborne said.

CAA wants to increase professional fees because they are seeing an increase in enrollment, and with this increase of students comes an increase in student and equipment needs, Dean of CAA Shauna Corry said.

The professional fee for the College of Law is called the Law Dedicated Fee and is $6,192 for full-time law students. It is $688 per credit for part-time law students, according to the 2019-2020 per semester tuition and fee schedule on the UI website.

These fees go toward funding student activities and competitions, clinic duties that give students hands-on experience, and programs within the college, Director of Administrative and Fiscal Operations for College of Law Mike Nugen said.

Housing

University of Idaho Housing and Residence Life housing prices are expected to rise approximately 2% next academic year depending on a student’s specific housing choice.

Keeping in mind that UI has an on-campus living requirement for first-year students the Housing and Residence Life has left Theophilus Tower price the same for this year to allow students who may need it a cheaper living option.

The finalized prices have been sent to the Idaho State Board of Education and UI is just waiting approval from them. Jennifer Skinner, customer relations manager for Housing and Residence Life, said in the 12-plus years she has worked at UI she hasn’t seen the numbers rejected by the State Board.

Skinner added the reason the State Board likely doesn’t reject their numbers is because UI’s housing price rises below the national average.

“We truly believe students will do better on campus if they’re here on campus. We can give back and help on the academic side too, by giving money back,” Skinner said. “I’ve always looked at us, as, we’re just the arm that helps the university.”

Housing and Residence Life is not affected by the state-wide tuition freeze as they are a part of UI’s Auxiliary Services.

UI’s Auxiliary Services is comprised of UI’s Golf Course, Housing and Residence Life, Vandals Dining, the VandalStore and AuxIT.

AuxIT is auxiliary’s own Information Technology service which helps with technology problems from students who live in the residence halls who need help installing a PlayStation to fixing a register that breaks at the VandalStore, Kosh said.

“Auxiliary — to put it bluntly — is a self-sustaining operation,” John Kosh, marketing director for Auxiliary Services, said. “They’re often seen as profit generation, so (Auxiliary Services) don’t mingle with the general fund.”

Housing and Residence Life have to pay a General and Administrative Fee (G&A) to UI which pays for costs of overreaching expenses HumanResources, Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable and other central support services, according to a G&A resource guide on UI’s website.

Enrollment

Strategic Enrollment Management (SEM) has eliminated nonessential vacant positions within the department in an effort to cut back on costs. They have also moved positions from SEM to other departments within the university. For example, the College of Graduate Studies recently took on a SEM employee to run enrollment marketing for the college, Vice Provost of SEM Dean Kahler said.

“We’ve done a lot of different kinds of shuffling and moving around and trying to save money to optimize how SEM is working right now,” Kahler said.

They have also increased recruiting efforts around the country and outside of the country, where recruiters in the fall visited hundreds of different high schools.

Western Undergraduate Exchange

The Western Undergraduate Exchange (WUE) is a program implemented by the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education (WICHE) in 1987. According to the WUE FAQ on the WICHE website, WUE is an agreement between 16 states and territories that offers discounted tuition in higher education institutions for residents from those participating regions, between those regions.

According to a UI news release, “University of Idaho WUE Extended to 16 States and Territories in the Northwest,” the WUE tuition rate
for UI was extended to all 16 regions instead of only Alaska, Washington and Oregon in 2018. At that point, the only criteria for receiving WUE tuition was having a high school GPA of at least 3.2 and being from one of the 16 regions. The criteria for receiving the WUE tuition rate varied depending on the prospective student’s educational background. At that point, there was and still is no cap on the number of students who can receive the WUE tuition rate.

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Last year UI eliminated the GPA requirements, opening the WUE even more. This was an effort to be more competitive in the higher education market and attract more non-resident students to UI, Kahler said. Making this switch to include all 16 states and eliminating the GPA requirement is expected to generate enrollment stability but is also potentially causing a loss in tuition dollars, Mahoney said.

“Each year we’re graduating students who came and were paying us the full non-resident rate and replacing those with students that are just paying the WUE rate. Which again, great for students in the long run, great for the University of Idaho, but it’s a financial hit. So, to the tune of about $4.5 million, just in FY20,” Mahoney said.

The $4.5 million loss is part of the $14 million deficit for this fiscal year. However, the additional $8 million deficit is the projected effect the WUE transition will have on the university over the next two years. Instead of making cuts year after year, UI is trying to implement a one-time change to make up for potentially lost tuition dollars, Mahoney said.

However, non-resident enrollment had been declining for some-time. But since the full implementation of the WUE, non-resident enrollment has increased.

“Non-resident enrollments are definitely going back up. So, at
2016 when I looked at it … Our nonresident enrollments were going down. Since the implementation of WUE, we’ve seen our non-resident numbers continue to go back up. So, is WUE costing us or are we actually benefitting from it is the perspective that we have to figure out,” Kahler said.

Kahler said he believes that over time, WUE enrollment will continue to increase.

Voluntary incentive programs

On Nov. 22, 2019, President C. Scott Green sent out a presidential memo addressing voluntary incentive programs. He said that the employees who choose to leave UI are given a certain percentage of their salary for a set number of years as an incentive.

UI allowed any eligible employees to apply for either program Voluntary Separation Incentive Program (VSIP) or Optional Retirement Incentive Program (ORIP).

As of Feb. 18, 112 people have accepted, totaling $8,446,431 in base salaries, Jodi Walker director of communications, said.

Out of the 112 people, 36 of them accepted the VSIP which totaled $2,590,536 in base salaries. For the ORIP 76 people have accepted which totaled $5,855,895 in base salaries.

Those who take the VSIP program will receive a one-time payment of 33% of their current salary in Fiscal Year 2021 (FY21).

While the ORIP retirement plan will pay those who have accepted 20% of their current salary for three years starting in FY21. The University of Idaho originally stated they would offer five years, Walker said.

Outsourcing

When a private company enters a partnership with UI and manages
a specific area of UI operations, that’s outsourcing. In the past, UI outsourced Sodexo, and they became the university dining partner.
Now, UI is looking to outsource for facilities.

Several companies have expressed interest in outsourcing for UI and have submitted proposals. UI is currently reviewing these proposals and have yet to make a decision if they are going to outsourcing at all, or which company they want to enter a partnership with, Mahoney said.

A decision on outsourcing facilities will be made in the future, but proposals are currently still at the Request for Proposal committee, Walker said.

Program prioritization

UI is still looking over program prioritization. And there has not been a final decision on whether UI will be cutting a program, Walker said. Though it is still an option being decided.

Alex Brizee and Sam Bruce can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @alex_brizee