On November 20th, I wrote a letter to the regents to express my concerns regarding the recent fee hikes.  On December 10th, I got the following reply.

Response from University of California President Mark Yudof to your email:

I am writing to acknowledge your e-mail to the Board of Regents regarding the recent fee increase.   They have asked me to respond on their behalf, and I am pleased to do so.  As you might imagine, The Regents and I have received a good many letters and emails, almost all expressing dismay over the decision to raise fees.  I am reading each and every one, but because of the volume, responding to individual messages is simply impossible, so I am sending this same response to all.

I want to begin by saying that I completely understand the anger, frustration, and outrage of our students and their parents. And, I do fully comprehend what this fee increase will mean for our students.  Your anger, as righteous as it is, however, is misdirected.  Our fight is not with one another but with Sacramento.  The fact of the matter is that over the past 19 years, the State’s inflation-adjusted contribution per UC student has declined by more than 50 percent.  This very disturbing fact reflects a multi-year trend of continuously greater disinvestment in UC by the State of California.  In the end, when it comes to the University’s core support, we have only two main sources–taxpayer dollars from the State and student fees.  Even with deep administrative cuts, when one goes down, the other almost inevitably must go up.  And the fact of the matter is that the State of California has put us in an absolutely untenable position by cutting $800 million from our budget in this year alone.  I enclose a fact sheet on student fees that you may find of interest and you may also be interested in listening to my comments to the press at http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/electronic.aspx?fid=86142&id=E0C5478

I assure you, we are not sitting back quietly nor are we balancing the University’s budget on the backs of our students.  Far from it.  We are making the University’s case every day in Sacramento in innumerable ways, and every member of the UC community is sharing the pain in very personal ways.  We have instituted layoffs (with more to come in the new year) and hiring freezes, reduced course offerings, increased class sizes, eliminated programs, instituted service reductions, and the list goes on.  Faculty and staff salaries at all levels throughout the system have been reduced through the University’s salary reduction/furlough program.  In addition, the Office of the President has undergone a thorough restructuring and downsizing, generating a savings of $62.2 million, and other savings measures are being implemented.

In the end, and to our great dismay, student fee increases have been and continue to be necessary if UC is to retain faculty, maintain course offerings, and preserve quality, as well as preserve its mission to provide access to the state’s most talented students.  Classes are growing larger, critical courses are not always available, and wonderful professors are being lured by other institutions.  Our students, alas, are in a no-win situation.  Either their fees go up, or their education will suffer.

What you may not have heard in the coverage of The Regents’ meeting is that on my recommendation, The Regents adopted a financial plan that asks the State to fully fund the University’s needs by providing an additional $913 million to restore program cuts, pay for unfunded enrollment growth, end employee furloughs and contribute to the UC Retirement Plan.

In the meantime, however, the fee increase will allow us to staunch the bleeding.  We will restart faculty hiring and begin restoring some vital student services such as library hours that were curtailed because of the budget crisis.  We can address class size and course cancellations that affect students’ ability to graduate on time.  And, I assure you, no funds from the fee increase will go to administrative salaries.  Each and every one of the measures I have just mentioned is intended to head off crisis-driven threats to the quality of a UC education.

We are also doing our best to mitigate the burden of increased fees on students with financial need.  Taken together, the fee increases will generate $560 million, of which roughly one third, or about $175 million, will be set aside for financial aid.  As a result, UC has a robust financial aid program that makes attendance possible for most of our students.  If I have anything to say about it, there will not be any students who will not be able to afford a UC education.

To those of you who are considering dropping out because you do not believe you can pay the increase in fees, I beg of you not to.  Please make an appointment today with your campus’ financial aid office.  The Blue and Gold Opportunity Plan, which combined with increases in Pell and Cal grants and the federal tax credit expansions implemented by the Obama administration (including a negative income tax for the poorer students), will ensure that needy California undergraduate students with a total family income of $70,000 or less will pay no fees.

For those not eligible for the Blue and Gold Opportunity Plan, I urge you, too, to talk with a financial aid advisor as well.  Needy families with incomes higher than $70,000 per year may be offered partial grants to offset some of the fee increases.  And federal student loans are at fixed rates with generous repayment options; plus loans for parents do not have to be repaid while any of your students are enrolled in college.  In addition, you may not be aware of a new, expanded federal educational tax credit, passed into law as part of the economic stimulus legislation that would allow families to recoup as reduced federal taxes up to $2500 per year per student of the tuition, fees, and course material expenses paid out-of-pocket or with an education loan.  The American Opportunity Tax Credit may be available to you for 2009 and 2010, if you meet the criteria; I urge you to also seek advice from a tax expert to see if your family can benefit from this generous tax credit designed for those paying for college.

I am as deeply troubled as you are over the steps we are being forced to take to address our shortfall.  If I had my way, not only would we not increase fees, there would be no fees.  But that is not the world in which we live–the University does not have the funds to cover the devastating loss of State funding that has been imposed on us.  That is the plain, simple, honest, and painful truth.  In the end, I truly believe we must take these steps if we are to preserve the quality of our institution over the longer term.  I assure you, in no uncertain terms, that the one thing that will not happen on my watch is a retreat into mediocrity.  UC is the greatest public university in the world and I intend to see that it remains as such.

I urge you to join me in telling your legislators how you are being affected by their actions.  They are in a position to right this situation and they need to hear not just from me but from you, your parents, grandparents, friends, and neighbors.

With best wishes, I am,

Sincerely yours,

Mark G. Yudof

President

Fact Sheet–2009-10 and 2010-11 undergraduate fees and financial aid