As costs continue to soar for Texas college students, a bipartisan cadre of lawmakers says students would get a better deal if politicians controlled tuition and fees – a power the Legislature ceded to schools in 2003.

“The difference between that year that you point to, 2003, is [that is] when the Democrats no longer had control of spending and the Republicans took control of spending,” Patrick said.

Asked about The News’ findings, Patrick, a Republican, said Democrats who controlled the Legislature at the time might be to blame.

Angelo State University Lamar University Midwestern State University Prairie View A&M University Sam Houston State University Stephen F. Austin State University Sul Ross State University Tarleton State University Texas A&M International University Texas A&M University-Central Texas Texas A&M University-College Station Texas A&M University-Commerce Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Texas A&M University-Galveston Texas A&M University-Kingsville Texas A&M University-San Antonio Texas A&M University-Texarkana Texas Southern University Texas State University Texas Tech University Texas Woman's University University of Texas-Arlington University of Texas-Austin University of Texas-Brownsville University of Texas-Dallas University of Texas-El Paso University of Texas-San Antonio University of Texas-Tyler University of Texas of the Permian Basin University of Texas-Pan American University of Houston University of Houston-Clear Lake University of Houston-Downtown University of Houston-Victoria University of North Texas University of North Texas-Dallas West Texas A&M University

Use the menu below to explore trends by school.

Over the last 25 years, Texas universities have steadily increased their charges to graduate and undergraduate students, while state funding of schools has stagnated. The result: At most Texas schools, students are bearing more of the burden than taxpayers.

Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who has led a push to examine tuition in next year’s legislative session, blamed “outrageous spending” on top leaders’ salaries and bonuses, sports programs and administrative expenses for driving up costs. He said schools “seem not to be focused on controlling spending.”

“Boards of regents are best positioned to make decisions about tuition,” David E. Daniel, deputy chancellor of the University of Texas System, said when presented with The News’ findings. “They have a deep understanding of each institution’s unique circumstances.”

The trends, and how lawmakers choose to look at them, will be a crucial factor in a looming showdown over whether the Legislature should wrest tuition-setting power from university officials, who’ll argue they’re the better stewards.

That’s based on incomplete data published by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, which didn’t track data for the years preceding deregulation. The News analyzed all 37 Texas four-year public colleges and relied on federal data, which goes back much further than what the state maintains.

Those leading the charge for the “re-regulation” of tuition and fees – giving that power back to lawmakers – cite steep increases since four-year public university administrators began calling the shots 13 years ago.

The findings run counter to much of the narrative among Austin politicos who say school officials have used their authority to force students to bear an ever-increasing burden of funding their education.

A Dallas Morning News analysis of average undergraduate tuition and fees over the last quarter-century found that costs rose faster at most Texas public colleges and universities when lawmakers set the prices.

Average costs for full-time undergraduates rose at a higher clip at 12 of the 37 Texas campuses analyzed, or less than one-third, when school administrators were in control. But those dozen campuses were catching up with the rest of the state, the data suggest. At the time of deregulation, they were charging on average nearly $1,000 less than the rest of the schools.

Since 1990, the data shows, tuition and fees ballooned by more than 300 percent, after adjusting for inflation. On average, Texas college students paid just less than $1,000 a year in 1990, compared with more than $7,000 now.

That's a difference of more than $6,000 a year.

Skyrocketing tuition and fees

Undergraduate tuition and fees have risen steadily at every Texas university and college at a rate well above inflation. In general, tuition rose faster at schools when lawmakers controlled rates.

Use the menu below to explore trends by school.

Angelo State University Lamar University Midwestern State University Prairie View A&M University Sam Houston State University Stephen F. Austin State University Sul Ross State University Tarleton State University Texas A&M International University Texas A&M University-College Station Texas A&M University-Commerce Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Texas A&M University-Kingsville Texas A&M University-Texarkana Texas Southern University Texas State University Texas Tech University Texas Woman's University University of Texas-Arlington University of Texas-Austin University of Texas-Brownsville University of Texas-Dallas University of Texas-El Paso University of Texas-San Antonio University of Texas-Tyler University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio University of Texas Medical Branch University of Texas of the Permian Basin University of Texas-Pan American University of Houston University of Houston-Clear Lake University of Houston-Downtown University of Houston-Victoria University of North Texas University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center West Texas A&M University

Annual rate of tuition increases

under lawmakers' control

under schools' control



↑ under lawmakers' control ↓ under schools' control

*Average undergraduate tuition and fees



Source: Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System maintained by the National Center for Education Statistics

Those skyrocketing costs have coincided with significant cuts in what the state spends on public colleges and universities.

Lawmakers in recent years have approved modest increases in state funding of public institutions, but now students and parents — rather than taxpayers — carry most of the cost to keep schools running. For many students, that means huge loans, a national trend that has sparked extensive debate about the cost and value of higher education.

And that funding chasm is growing, which may force lawmakers and higher education officials to compromise, said Michael McLendon, dean of education at Baylor University.

“On the one hand, colleges and universities must be more sensitive to the mounting price resistance and the deep concerns around high tuition levels on the part of segments of the populace,” said McLendon. As a private university, Baylor is unaffected by the state debate, but McLendon has overseen multiple studies on tuition and fee trends in Texas as a dean there and at Southern Methodist University.

“At the same time, policymakers may overlook the fact that the costs of operating universities are higher by nature than the costs of operating other public and private sector enterprises,” he said, “and this has real implications for the ability of universities to sustain high levels of quality.”

Why deregulate?

In 2003, Republican lawmakers and leaders were determined to fill a multibillion-dollar budget shortfall without raising taxes. They cut $173 million in higher education funding.

One way to compensate, both Republicans and Democrats said, was to give schools flexibility to bring in more money without dipping further into state coffers.

Around that time, Sen. Judith Zaffirini, a Laredo Democrat who had staunchly opposed tuition increases of any kind, attended a meeting where then-UT System Chancellor Mark Yudof warned there was one likely consequence.

“He came in and said, ‘Tuition increases,’ and I crossed my fingers in a cross,” Zaffirini remembered. “Then he said, ‘Next subject.’ ”

But Zaffirini ultimately was among the 17 senators who voted to surrender tuition-setting power to schools, after talking with her son Carlos, then a graduate student at UT in Austin. He argued schools needed to control tuition to maintain the quality of their academic programs.

“The fact of the matter is that we also have to focus on excellence, and what is the cost of excellence?” she said. “If you want a cheap education, I can get you one, but I think that our purpose in the Legislature is to focus on affordability simultaneously with excellence.”

Majorities in both houses, skeptical that universities would raise tuition by leaps and bounds, ultimately decided to trust schools to balance affordability with quality.

“I don’t believe any university would be foolish enough to jack up prices immediately,” Florence Shapiro, a Plano Republican who carried the bill in the Senate, said then. “If they go out and abuse this authority, we will pull them in.”

The next year, at the University of Texas at Dallas, average tuition and fees jumped from $4,220 a year to $5,276 – a hike of more than 25 percent.

Tuition rising

Much of the debate over rising costs has hinged on incomplete data kept by the state higher education board.

Because the board was not required to track tuition and fees data before 2003, most lawmakers have seen only the steep tuition hikes enacted by university administrators.

But public universities are required to report their average undergraduate costs to the federal National Center for Education Statistics, whose complete data shows tuition has risen steeply under both stewards.

Every public college and university in Texas has experienced a marked increase in tuition and fees over the last 25 years, but some have seen greater increases than others.

Prairie View A&M University students experienced the biggest increase, about 562 percent, adjusting for inflation. The University of Texas at Dallas came in at No. 2, with an increase of 530 percent, to $10,864 last year.

On the lower end of the spectrum, University of Texas campuses in Brownsville and Odessa saw increases of around 150 percent.

The Texas trend is steep compared with the rest of the country, where the national tuition average has increased about 161 percent in the same time period after adjusting for inflation, according to figures published by the College Board.

The trend shows no signs of slowing.

The state’s two largest systems – Texas A&M and the University of Texas – recently approved tuition and fees increases at nearly all of their campuses.

Patrick said that shows university leaders are “out of touch” with students and parents concerned about being priced out of a chance at higher education.

Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick says university leaders are “out of touch” with students and parents. Photo by Eric Gay/Associated Press





“We want the best universities in the country,” Patrick said. “But to have them, we cannot let them continue to spend unlimited money like there is no tomorrow.”

The looming tuition fight has made strange bedfellows of staunch conservatives – such as Patrick and his Senate leaders who want to control costs but offer no indication of wanting to invest significant state money – with Democrats who also want to control costs but seem more willing to allocate state dollars.

“Some of our most liberal members as well as some of our most conservative members want to either cap tuition or take control of it back at the legislative level,” said Patrick, whose chamber is leading the discussion. “I support both. You know, regulating tuition again at the state level is something we shouldn’t have to do, but we’re going to do it, I believe, if they don’t start acting much more responsibly."

Other senators are planning to push proposals to give the Legislature the authority to either cap or slow the rate of tuition increases.

Sen. Charles Schwertner, R-Georgetown, plans to resurrect legislation he pushed in 2015 to prohibit Texas universities from increasing tuition and fees by more than the rate of inflation.

If that had happened starting in 1990 all the way to the 2014-15 academic year, the data indicate, the average yearly cost for full-time undergraduates would be in the ballpark of about $2,000. School leaders say that would stymie their ability to remain competitive nationally and would prohibit them from attracting top professors and researchers.

Schwertner said administrators who accept that argument are perpetuating what he called an “academics arms race” where more academic researchers and programs beget higher costs and higher tuition and vice versa.