Last week’s Board of Visitors meetings incited outrage for a number of reasons. We wrote last week about the Board’s failure to address issues of diversity through its Diversity and Inclusion Committee; however, the most controversial decision the Board made last week was to unilaterally raise tuition. The Board increased tuition for all students by 3.9 percent, but for in-state students entering the University in Fall 2015, there will be a $1,000 increase, with an additional $1,000 increase for in-state students entering in Fall 2016. Ultimately, according to Board member Helen Dragas, the incoming Class of 2019 will face a 13.4 percent increase in tuition from Fall 2014.
The pros and cons of these increases have been heavily debated, but the most troubling element of the Board’s decision was the non-transparent nature of the vote. According to Dragas, the proposal, which was outlined by the Board’s Finance Committee, was only described to her by John Griffin, vice chairman of that committee, in a phone call on Mar. 20. Dragas recalls speaking with just four other Board members that weekend, “three of whom were completely unaware of the proposal.”
While Griffin contends that the Board held four public meetings in which these issues were discussed, the actual tuition plan was not presented in its entirety until Tuesday, Mar. 20. To be clear, the Board’s action was perfectly legal. Though the proposal was not presented to the public until Mar. 20, Griffin said he was informed this was not necessary until the proposal had been presented to the full Board. But, according to Dragas, even the full Board was not fully briefed on the proposal before quickly meeting to vote on it. A vote on tuition changes requires significant consideration; for all Board members not to feel fully prepared for such a vote is troubling.
Even Meg Gould, the non-voting student representative to the Board, pointed to the lack of transparency in the Board’s decision as a reason “students feel that they weren’t given sufficient time to understand the policy and [felt] unheard or unrepresented.” While information was posted publicly, according to Gould, the final tuition policy information was only publicized shortly before the Board members voted.
Arguably, the Board was transparent in its vote in that its meetings were public and some members have expressed their opinions about the vote. But students need information about such policy proposals well in advance so they can carefully consider the proposals and form coalitions as they see fit. While students did protest Board meetings Tuesday and Wednesday, if they had been informed of the policy changes earlier, they might have been able to amass a larger crowd. Every student is affected by tuition increases — therefore every student deserves such information long enough in advance that they have the chance to voice their opinions.
Transparency is essential to good governance. With a Board of Visitors that has failed to be transparent in the past, we can only hope that at this point members have learned from those mistakes. We recognize that members have the school’s best interests in mind when making these decisions — but surely it is in the school’s best interest to have as much input from its students as possible.
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