KU just proposed another tuition increase for next school year. Here’s how much
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- KU proposed a fourth consecutive tuition increase for the next academic year.
- In-state undergraduate tuition at KU would rise 4.8% and out-of-state 5.3%.
- A Kansas resident taking 15 credits at KU could pay $6,635 per semester next year.
The University of Kansas is seeking to raise student tuition for a fourth straight year.
Under the plan put forward by university officials, undergraduate students paying in-state tuition at the Lawrence campus next school year would see their tuition go up by 4.8% and out-of-state undergraduates would experience a 5.3% hike.
The tuition request, which KU presented to the Kansas Board of Regents on Wednesday, comes as the university grapples with funding challenges at the state and federal levels.
“University leadership remains committed to keeping tuition and fees as affordable as possible while sustaining high-quality academic programs during a period of significant change in higher education,” reads KU’s written request, which could be approved or amended at KBOR’s June meeting.
Despite plans to hold student fees flat, KU is poised to remain the most expensive of Kansas’ six state universities, based on each school’s proposal for next year.
A Kansas resident taking 15 undergraduate credit hours at KU could expect to pay $6,635 per semester in tuition and fees next school year — $318 more than for the same course load during the recently completed academic year.
The same student eligible for in-state tuition and fees would pay $6,024 per semester next year at Kansas State University, $5,164 at Wichita State University, $4,420 at Pittsburg State University, $3,611 at Emporia State University, or $3,238 at Fort Hays State University.
Emporia State is the only school that did not request permission for a tuition increase.
KU’s combined 5% tuition and fees increase for in-state undergraduate students was the second-largest proposed hike behind only a 5.9% increase at Fort Hays State — the most affordable university in the state to attend.
The cost of higher education in Kansas has steadily climbed in recent years. If KU’s tuition and fees proposal is approved, full-time undergraduate students next school year will be paying more than $1,000 per semester above what they would have been paying in 2020, KBOR records show.
“With college and basic necessities only growing more expensive, we were thankfully in a position this year to propose a flat fee of $532.50 per semester,” said Nathan Binshtok, who served as chair of the KU Student Senate’s finance council last school year.
He told the regents on Wednesday that KU’s most recent student fee survey drew more than 2,600 responses.
“Even with the understanding that a reduction in fees would reduce the services available to students, almost half of our survey respondents still cited a preference for reducing student fees,” Binshtok said.
Higher education funding cuts
Jeff DeWitt, KU’s chief financial officer, told the regents that Kansas’ higher education system is facing “unprecedented challenges” due to state and federal funding cuts.
This spring, Kansas lawmakers slashed 2.5% of base operations funding for the state’s three public research universities — KU, K-State and WSU — and eliminated the entire budget line item for student success funding, which was designed to improve universities’ retention and graduation rates.
“Need-based aid was flat and the salary increase that we’re receiving is $1.6 million. We’re going to have to find another $2.5 million to get 1% (raises) for everyone,” DeWitt said. “The cut in the state side is part of the reason for our tuition proposal.”
The federal government has also faltered in its support for higher education, as the Trump administration has overseen sweeping cuts and freezes to grant programs that universities rely on.
“We’re living on our current grants. Future grants are not being awarded, even though we’ve submitted twice our normal outflow,” DeWitt said. “Just nothing is coming in. Even though the budget is up, the flow of funds from the federal government has essentially stopped.”
In the coming months, KU Chancellor Douglas Girod is expected to play an important role in efforts to restore key federal funding streams.
Last October, he was chosen to take over as board chair of the American Association of Universities, a major lobbying force in Washington.
