By Masudur Rahman

Senior Reporter

The Board of Trustees passed a proposal with a vote of 7-1 last Wednesday to restructure the non-mandatory student fees so that fees for orientation, transcript, graduation, applied music courses, physical therapy courses, education courses and nursing assessment will be rolled in the tuition. Also, students applying to Oakland University will no longer have to pay the application fee.

This new tuition program will begin to be implemented beginning in June, and will also apply for students attending orientation beginning in June 2008. To offset the loss of revenue from the non-mandatory student fees, the tuition will be increased by 1 percent starting in the fall 2008 semester, on top of any other increases that might take place due to other reasons.

The tuition increase will affect all students, regardless of whether or not they will use services such as orientation, transcripts, take courses in physical therapy or education, for example. Michelle Moser, Assistant Director of Media Relations, said that the tuition increase will not be individualized for each student, and that “all students in a given division (lower, upper, graduate) will pay the same amount per credit hour, regardless of their program or major.”

She said that this will create “administrative efficiencies by eliminating the arduous and time-consuming processing and reconciliation of these fees.”

The elimination of the application fee will make OU the only university in Michigan that will not charge prospective students for applying.

According to an article on the OU News Web site, Mary Beth Snyder, Vice President for Student Affairs, expects that this will increase the number of applications received to the university, which will allow for a more diverse student population.

Moser said that another positive aspect of this new tuition restructuring is that some students may be eligible for more financial aid, because the non-mandatory student fees, which were previously not allowed to be included in the calculation of financial aid awards, will now be allowed to be so, because they will be part of the tuition.

Cindy Hermsen, Director of Financial Aid, estimated that about 75 percent of OU students will receive financial aid in 2008-2009. She also said that the “simplicity of understanding one tuition rate with no additional hidden costs (except behavioral fees such as late payment penalties)” and being able to predict full costs will be beneficial to all students.

“Previously students were surprised when charged additional fees related to their education,” Hermsen said.

Student Body President Steve Clark and Student Liaisons to the Board of Trustees Samir Hanna and Aaron Kochenderfer agreed that the elimination of the application fee will benefit the university and that the possibility of being eligible for more financial aid will be good for the students.

“Tuition increase is something I’ll never be in favor of,  but the money lost by the eliminated fees has to come from somewhere,” Clark said.

Kochenderfer said, “I think Oakland University will do a good job in explaining this to students, and when students hear the explanation, they’ll see that they won’t be paying any more than they are already; it will just be easier to pay. Overall, I think this is a good thing.”

“Overall, this will be better for most students and the overall university community,” Hanna said.

Michelle Moser said that the new tuition program was proposed because “the administration felt it was in the best interest of students and the entire university to discontinue all fees.”

The Board of Trustees also approved proposals of new degree programs. These degree programs are a bachelor of arts and minor in writing and rhetoric, a bachelor of arts in Japanese, and a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering.