UTSA proposing tuition increase

University of Texas at San Antonio students could see an increase in what they pay for tuition in the next two years.

The proposed tuition boost would mean an increase in undergraduate tuition costs for full-time in-state students from $2,891 per semester to $3,004 this fall, before rising to $3,121 in fall 2013.

The proposed rates are to be considered for approval by the University of Texas System Board of Regents sometime this spring. Tuition increased the past two years for the area's largest university.

UTSA spokesman David Gabler said the latest proposal came out of discussions with a student committee, which he said approved the increase. All the money from the increases would go only to academic programming, he said.

“There are a lot of reasons for this,” Gabler said. “We are trying to attract top-notch faculty, improve our faculty-student ratio and deal with the state funding cuts.”

Enrollment reached 31,000 last year, pushing the ratio of students per faculty member to 25-to-1, among the highest in the state. UTSA President Ricardo Romo has said he aims to reduce that to 20-to-1.

Last year, the Texas Legislature cut UTSA's state funding by 12 percent from $281 million to $260 million, and it cut an additional $12 million in a “supplemental” budget bill for some of its programs. The effects are now trickling down to students, raising the ire of some local legislators who decried their colleagues' votes for the cuts.

“Now that universities have made their own budget cuts they have little choice but to raise tuition if they want to maintain a quality education for their students,” State Rep. Mike Villarreal, D-San Antonio, said in a news release. “If Texans believe our young people deserve better, they need to tell legislators they want the state to invest in our schools and pursue a vision of Texas that includes educated children prepared for the future.”

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