Students could see additional need-based financial aid and faculty could see the first wage increase in four years following a preliminary vote on the FY 13 budget proposal.
The board preliminarily approved a $252 million budget and a tuition increase of 3.75 percent, a portion of which will go toward hiring 20 new faculty members as part of the Provost’s academic plan.
The five-year plan would cost $4,273,330 and includes language to hire 20 new faculty members, additional advisers, create a degree-granting honors college at UNM and increase pay for faculty. The plan aims for growth in research, online enrollment, as well as improvement in six-year graduation rates and freshmen retention, Provost Chaouki Abdallah said.
The Board of Regents said funds from the proposed tuition increase would help cover the cost.
The Provost’s plan also calls for an additional $250,000 to create more graduate assistantships.
“We need to make an investment in instruction across all areas of the University,” UNM President David Schmidly said.
Under the proposal, 20 percent of the tuition increase, about $3.6 million, will go toward providing need-based financial aid to students. Currently, 26 percent of financial aid goes to need-based scholarships, while the rest goes to merit-based scholarships.
“The first is access — making sure the doors of the institution are open and available to students who want to come here,” he said. “Affordability — making sure our students and their families can afford their education. Student services — particularly in the light of the new formula of funding, UNM will have to be focused on the things and invest in those things that will make our students successful, and quality of instruction.”
Schmidly said tuition and fees at UNM are low compared to peer institutions in the region, including Arizona State University, the University of Arizona, Texas Tech, Colorado State University and NMSU.
Schmidly said the University’s resident tuition and fees are 14.5 percent below the national average and nonresident tuition and fees are 5 percent below the national average.
UNM’s tuition and fees for full-time, in-state undergraduates this spring is only $2,904, compared to $4,860 at Arizona State University, a peer institution, according to the registrar offices of both schools.
The regents also preliminarily approved $3.79 million in one-time funding to be used for faculty and staff salary increases. UNM employees have not seen a pay raise in four years, and the dollar amount represents an average of a 1.75 percent increase in salaries.
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UNM Faculty Senate President Tim Ross asked the board to consider making this funding recurring and the regents agreed to discuss the proposal at the meeting next month.
The budget proposal also included $427,000 to subsidize insurance costs for employees making less than $50,000 a year.
Regent Jamie Koch proposed an increase in the minimum wage for UNM employees from $9 an hour to $10 an hour, and the proposal will be addressed at next month’s meeting.
Regent Jamie Koch said he was impressed by the President’s budget.
“You’ve done what you said you were going to do,” he said to Schmidly. ”You kept refining it and we appreciate your efforts.”
Also at the meeting:
The Regents also voted 3-2 in favor of renovating a vacant building at 1650 University Boulevard NE for use by the Health Sciences Center. The renovation would cost $4.9 million. Regents Jamie Koch and Gene Gallegos opposed the renovation, arguing in favor of creating an entirely new building, which they said would be more cost-effective.
