Fall 2017 Eastern Region Meeting

[Anonymous]

Fall meeting was held at SUNY Cobleskill – had a great discussion regarding Cuomo’s Tuition Plan and SUNY’s tuition and fees. Below are minutes from this meeting.

Casey has returned and she and I will be touching base to discuss the Spring 2018 meeting!

Josh Sager, Associate Vice Chancellor for Finance and Business
Spoke about Excelsior and Cuomo’s Tuition Plan
• Discussion of SUNY tuition and fees
o National average of tuition and fees is 9,970 with SUNY 4-year being below average at 8,590
o SUNY increases have remained steady – NY pays for employee benefits (not for CCs) so this tends to keep tuition low
o SUNY tuition has stayed low for non-residents and only increases slightly when enrollment has been low
o Community College (CC) average tuition is 3,570 – SUNY CC is above average at 4,676 (CUNY at 5,282). NY does not pay for CC employee benefits
o Cost of attendance components are: tuition, fees, books/supplies, on campus room/board, off campus room/board (with family or without family)
 SUNY is on the lower side (4 year is around 24K a year, 2-yr is around 17K a year)
 Room and board are the main reasons why cost of attendance increases each year. There has always been a substantial increase after a recession
• Types of aid available:
o Federal: Pell and SEOG
o State: TAP, scholarships, excelsior
o Institutional: SUNY TAP, varies
o Private: Rotaries, Businesses, etc
• Excelsior Program:
o You must be working toward your degree, have to have 30 credits completed per year that are not remedial, and income below 100,000 to qualify.
o Of the 605,000 resident undergraduate SUNY and CUNY students 31,300 qualified:
 250,000 receive TAP
 140,000 receive SUNY/CUNY TAP Gap Award
 280,000 receive federal Pell (so 280,000 receive some sort of combination of TAP and Pell
• Therefore if students made combined income of 50K or less their tuition was already being covered by above awards
 192,000 are P/T so do not qualify
 239,000 are 4 yr students and 174,000 are CC students
 55% of 4 yr students took 30 credits per year at SUNY, 29% at CUNY
 157,000 students were eligible prior to income requirements
• 33,200 from 4 yr and 7,500 at CCs made above 100,000 so did not qualify
• 52,000 from 4yr and 33,000 from CCs were already being covered by other awards
 Leaving the 31,000 who did qualify
o Recipients get 2016/17 tuition for 4 years with no increases
 This may lead to tuition increases but less than traditional increases
o Not all campuses have reported yet. There were less recipients than SUNY had planned on
• What’s next?
o SUNY will make sure Excelsior is funded in 2017/18
o They plan to change time-based cohort to recipient based
• Upcoming Budget Cycle:
o Sept/Oct – budget request to board for approval
o Nov/Dec – Approve budget request
o Jan – advocacy
o Feb – Amendments
o Feb/Mar – Budget testimony/negotiations/ more advocacy
o April = active budget
Campus Updates:

Brainstorming session for future regional and conference topics:
• Do more in Albany – more central location
• Do it on a Friday – tends to be less travel
• Make a call-in option
• Topic ideas:
o Veteran issues
o Different ways to communicate with students
o Professional development opportunities

Next Meeting:
Spring 2018 – TBD

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