Tuition on the table at Thursday's Trustees meeting
Undergraduate tuition for the 2009-2010 academic year will be set by the Board of Trustees Thursday.
The increase will affect all students without the CMU Promise, which includes all students who began attending Central Michigan University in August 2008 and all students who have been at CMU for more than five years.
The Board will meet at 9:30 a.m. Thursday in the President's Conference Room in the Bovee University Center.
Tuition will be set for the entire year at the meeting, said Heather Smith, assistant director of public relations.
"We do have one set tuition for the school year," she said. "Historically, our Board of Trustees has approved the operating budget in July."
The state budget has not been set and CMU is unaware of the appropriations it will receive. Interim University President Kathy Wilbur told Central Michigan Life in June that CMU "will be extremely fortunate if the budget is held constant from this year."
Wilbur also said students can expect a tuition increase by the Board for the upcoming school year.
"I am not sure what level we will end up at," she said. "I think you will see a reasonable tuition increase, but I do think there will be a tuition increase."
Last year, tuition was increased by 6.6 percent, costing students without the CMU Promise $324 per credit hour. Smith said Tuesday there was no estimate on how much the Trustees would increase or decrease tuition by.
Other universities in the state that have set tuition for the upcoming year have all raised theirs by as little as 3.8 percent at Eastern Michigan University, and as high as 6.3 percent at Saginaw Valley State University.
Smith said the increases at other universities are looked at by the Board, but do not necessarily influence CMU's decision.
Other business
Some of CMU's traffic ordinances will also be on the agenda. Ojibway, Calumet and Ottawa Courts will all be one-way. Ottawa will be eastbound, Calumet will be southbound and Ojibway will be west bound.
Three new parking lots will be authorized: lots 48, 49 and 56. All three will surround the new Education and Human Services Building. Lot 48 and 49 will contain 40 and 13 parking spaces, respectively, and will be for visitors and picking up and dropping off. Lot 56 will be a faculty-only lot.
The Board will also discuss funding to renovate some CMU-owned buildings. The new Event Center, which construction begins in the fall, will look to have a budget of $21 million. The funding for the new addition to the Health Professions Building will also be examined. The addition, which will house space for the recently-developed medical school, has a proposed budget of $2 million.
Off-campus, the boathouse on Beaver Island - where CMU has a biological station - has a proposed budget of $850,000 to renovate and restore it to historical status.
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