By Candace Allen

The semester is almost over and the University of Louisville administration still hasn’t given students a final word on tuition for the 2005-06 school year.

In mid-January, Susan Ingram, director of Budget and Financial Planning, told The Cardinal that the university was “very early in the tuition-setting process.”

Michael Curtin, vice president for Finance, said his department has a proposal for the new tuition price. The Board of Trustees will make a decision about the proposal.

The board and the SGA are scheduled to meet Tuesday, May 3, to hear the proposal; the vote will take place later, on May 12. If the proposal is accepted, tuition for undergraduates is scheduled to go up 9.75 percent from last fall. The increase will also apply to the medical and dental schools.

The cost of tuition is based on the amount of money the university receives from the state. An executive order signed by Governor Ernie Fletcher cut that funding by 2.5 percent, so tuition must go up to compensate.

Tuition for the fall 2004 semester for an undergraduate resident was $2,520. The proposal plans to change that to $2,766, an increase of $246. For nonresident undergraduates, the cost will go up from $6,876 to $7,546, an increase of $670. In-state tuition for graduate students was $2,736, which the proposal will increase to $3,003. For graduate nonresidents the cost was $7,542 and would go up to $8,277.

Students applying for an MBA can expect to see the cost of in-state tuition raised from $3,150 to $3,457 and $8,667 to $9,512 for nonresidents.

Students at the Brandeis School of Law will also be affected by the tuition increase. The tuition for Kentucky residents was $4,600 and the proposed increase will make it $5,049. The cost for a nonresident was $10,380 and will increase to $11,110.

Increases run across the board, including to the medical and dental students. The cost for a resident medical student was $16,436 and will increase to $18,040. For nonresidents, tuition was $38,802 and will increase to $40,406. The cost for a resident dental student was $14,154 and will increase to $15,534; nonresidents will face an increase from $34,786 to $38,180.

Despite the increases, students can take comfort in knowing U of L will have the second-lowest increases in the state for the 2005-06 year. The percentages range from 17 percent at Western Kentucky University to KCTCS, which includes JCC, at 6.5 percent.