The Clackamas print., April 17, 2019, Page 3, Image 3

BY JAS O N SISSON
Photo by Emily Roberts
NEWS EDITOR-..
Clackam as Com m unity College’ s Board
of Education voted to increase tuition for
the 2019-2020 school year;
The board voted at its April 10 meeting
to raise tuition by $3 to $103 per credit
hour fo r in -s ta te stu d e n ts and to
increase o u t-o f-s ta te tuition by $8 to
$274 per credit hour.
This decision came as a bit of a surprise
as th e ad m in istratio n had proposed
increases of $7 per credit hour for in ­
state tuition and $10 for o u t-o f-state;
the general student and technology fees
were also slated to be raised, each by 50
Cents per credit hour, but were ultimately
left at their current rates.
To begin the m eeting m ultiple letters
from concerned students were read into
the record, all of which focused generally College president Tim Cook, far left, and
on the proposed tuition increases and tuition at the April 10 meeting.
stressed the burden rising costs have
had a sim ilar focus. It came from Justin
on students’ educations. Several o f the
letters were from international students H a g e le , a stu d en t in th e p lu m b in g
concerned that they may no longer be apprenticeship program at CCC.
“ M y fear is that if that price keeps
able to attend the college if tuition and
going up, I w on’t be able to afford what
fees keep rising. One such letter, from
student government member Jinyoung I’ m doing,” Hagele,said. “ I ask that you
Park, detailed the challenges faced by guys th in k about how this w ill affect
those th a t aren ’ t tak in g out stud ent
international students.
“ I cam e to th e U .S . because I w a s, loans, that are going to work fu ll tim e,
enamored w ith the education style and who are paying for this all out of pocket. ”
The board laid out four scenarios
thought it could open up doors for my
future; However, the issue o f finance is for increases in tu ition over the next
distracting m e from w orking towards two years and the budget deficit: the
m y fu ll p o ten tial,” Park wrote. “ Even college m ay still be le ft w ith under
though I ’ve lived in the U .S . fo r over each o f th e m . T he un certain ty over
how m uch to increase tuition stemmed
six years, I ’ m still counted as an o u t-
o f-sta te student. I also can’t get a job from these potential shortfalls and the
because I ’ m an international student college’ s necessary reliance on Oregon’s
Com m unity C o lleg e Support Fund, or
w hich leads to more o b stacles.”
Other international students’ letters CCSF, w hich provides funding to the 17
also touched on the difficulty o f paying com m unity colleges across the state.
more than double the in -sta te tuition The current appropriation from the CCSF
is $590 m illion, w ith each com m unity
rate while also not being allowed to work.
A few , such as a letter fro m stud ent college getting a percentage of that total
governm ent m em ber Ariane M abano, that is largely dependent on its full-tim e
made clear that tuition increase s could enrollment numbers. For CCC to not face
force som e in te rn a tio n a l stu d e n ts ’ a budget deficit, the board would need to
not just approve a tuition increase but
hands.
“ T he raise in tu itio n m ay lead to would need the CCFS allocation to grow
students like me having to return home significantly — a historical uncertainty.
These budget com plications placed a
w itho ut co m p letin g our e d u ca tio n ,”
Mabano wrote. “ W hich I hope w ill not nuanced and difficult decision in front
o f th e board. The board ch air, G reg
be the case for me or anyone else.”
Chaim ov o f M ilw aukie, w as reluctant
Letters from Ideal students focused
to come down to $3 from the proposed $7
m ainly on the affordability o f college,
especially for those who aren’ t taking per credit hour increase because if CCSF
out student loans — or are trying their funding stays the same or doesn’t reach
best to not. The one in-person testimony the college’ s hope o f $647 m illion, the
Clackamas Print
CCC board members listen to student testimony while debating an increase in
board could be looking at a more drastic
increase in tuition next year as well as
potential cuts.
“ M y concern is th a t, le t’s say they
appropriate $600 million instead of $590
[m illion], whatever portion of that we
get I would just as soon try to save the job
of someone who works here rather than
reduce that tuition. And the quality of
the education we provide because when
we ended up cutting — frankly, gutting
— our staff 10 plus years ago when we
had the big down tu rn in fu nd in g. In
some ways we hurt ourselves more than
just the am ount o f funding .we had to
cut. So part of w hat I ’m trying to do is
prevent us from having any more of a
d eficit th an w e ’ re already going t o ,”
Chaim ov said.
The students’ testim ony, in the end,
seems to have made a difference.
“ I m ust say I was struck by several
o f the letters th a t we ju st read from
students, some o f whom were o u t-o f-
state or foreign stu d en ts,” said Dave
H u n t, a board m em ber rep resen ting
G la d s to n e w h o s p e a rh e a d e d th e
m o tio n fo r a low er tu itio n in crease.
H u n t’ s idea is to put the pressure on
the state legislatu re by p assin g a $3
per credit hour increase now and then
explicitly telling them “ w hatever you
do in the Com m unity College Support
Fund will have a direct im pact for the
n ext acad em ic y ear, w h ich also ju st
happens to be a few months before their
reelection.”
T h is g a m e o f le g is la tiv e ch ic k e n
th e c la c k a m a s p rin t.c o m
is p redicated on a sim ilar m ove by
u n iv e rsitie s in O rego n w here th ey
banded together in an attempt to extract
better funding from the legislature. For
com m u n ity colleges and the O regon
Co m m u nity College. A ssociation that
represents th e m , the ch allen ge m ay
prove more daunting.
“ I th in k our ch a lle n g e righ t now
frankly — I’ll just be real frank about it
— I don’t think OCCA is really that ready
to have that unified fro n t,” said college
President Tim Cook. “ And whether we’d
be able to have it next year or not, I have
some concerns.”
Though the vote w asn’ t unanim ous
th e board did ev en tu ally approve a
more modest tuition increase in H unt’ s
m otion.
“ I do th in k there is some benefit to
playing the universities’ card and there
is a chance that we could end up better
going w ith D ave’ s way than the. staff
recom m endation,” Chaim ov said.
“ How com fortable are you running
the risk?;” Chaim ov asked of Cook.
“ It’ s a chance. I will say I’ m your new
president, and I ’d like to be your old
president,” Cook retorted.humorously
before striking a more serious note. “ I
think we just need to acknowledge and
be really clear, I th in k everyone knows
this; but we need to be really clear that
we could be here in a year or two years
w ith som e pretty d ifficu lt d ecisions
around some pretty dramatic cuts if it
doesn’t go the way we w ant it to, and
some pretty dramatic increases.”
A p ril 17, 2019