I like to think that I’m responsible with my money. But, with the weekly latte and bagel from Meraki I buy myself at the end of a hard week, to the mountain of tuition and fees I have to pay every term, the money leaving my bank account adds up.
I can keep track of my weekly treats, but knowing exactly what my tuition expenses are going toward is harder to pin down.
So, on Jan. 13, when the Tuition and Fee Advisory Board and ASUO held a forum to give UO students an opportunity to learn more about the tuition setting process, I had to go.
The forum focused on where UO’s funding comes from and explained why UO’s tuition is so high, despite the university’s five-year tuition guarantee.
According to the State Higher Education Finance report, in 2024, on average, each United States state appropriated $10,820 per full-time resident student at four-year institutions. Oregon allocated about $4,000 less than the national average, only appropriating $6,200 per full-time resident student in 2024, ranking it No. 46 in the nation.
Oregon splits its higher education funds among all public Oregon universities, including UO, Oregon State University, Portland State University and Western Oregon University.
“Oregon over the last several decades… has chosen to invest relatively little in its public universities,” Brian Fox, UO’s associate vice president for budget, financial analysis and data analytics said. “So (UO has) to balance across different revenue streams — state appropriations and tuition being the biggest of those.”
According to Fox, although UO has the most full-time resident students, the university receives the least amount of state funding of all public Oregon universities.
Because of the low amount of state funding UO receives, the university has to set a higher tuition to manage the university’s budget. This leads to UO having a larger tuition revenue than all other public universities in Oregon.
When it comes to comparison across Big Ten schools, UO’s tuition ranks relatively high at $37,091 for in-state students and $65,553 for out-of-state students for the 2024-25 tuition cohort, according to UO Finance and Administration.
UO Executive Chief of Staff and TFAB board member Daphne Patrick says that UO’s extremely high out-of-state tuition is valued by the university.
“Administration and enrollment services of UO rely extremely heavily on out-of-state students to essentially subsidize the education of in-state students,” Patrick said. “I think (UO) does enough to justify the cost to students whose only other option is UC schools… we are really reliant on (those students).”
Even as an in-state student, Patrick says she remembers doing projects on Oregon’s public universities in elementary school when the tuition was half the price that it is today.
“I fear we’re approaching a moment in higher education where (tuition) can’t just keep doubling every five to 10 years without a serious reconsideration of the value of an education,” Patrick said.
Serving as an ASUO-appointed member of TFAB, Patrick said she struggles with the small number of undergraduate students elected to serve on a board that merely acts as a recommendation body to UO’s president.
Students have very little input into the conversations surrounding tuition at UO, conversations that directly affect each and every student.
The way in which the university goes about setting the tuition needs to change.
