For 15 years, every online class taken at UNM has a delivery fee of $100. But after Friday’s Board of Regents meeting, that fee may change — and not just for students taking online courses.
Vice Provost of Extended Learning Monica Orozco Obando and Associate Vice President of the Office of Planning, Budget and Analysis Andrew Cullen will propose an end to the delivery fee for all online classes at UNM. What would replace it is a mandatory fee that all students would pay each semester, regardless of their enrollment in online courses.
The new fee would range from approximately “$5.27 to $5.48 per student credit hour (depending on the number of credit hours taken a semester),” according to the Memorandum “Proposed Online Delivery Fee Modification” in the Board of Regents’ Finance and Facilities Committee meeting.
That would translate to about $132 for two semesters at 12 credit hours, and about $158 for two semesters at 15 credit hours.
Part of the reason for the shift is that the original model did not account for the use of UNM Learn, the University’s online classroom, in traditional face-to-face classes. So while 64 percent of students enroll in online courses, far more use the system to submit assignments or download lecture notes and class readings.
UNM’s first online courses became available in Spring of 2000. It was then that the $100 delivery fee was set at $100 for a 3-hour credit course. This set price has never been increased, according to the memorandum.
“Delivery fees on fully online courses entirely finance the infrastructure that now supports all course types offered by UNM,” Orozco and Cullen wrote in the Memorandum.
Travis Givens, a sophomore business marketing major, said a fee hike wouldn’t bother him.
“I wouldn’t mind taking an extra 20 cents more for each class, especially if one day I take on a work load and need to take a few online classes,” he said. “I’d rather pay 20 cents more than $100 more.”
Kili Murray, a senior English major, said she was unsure of how she felt about the change.
“Having never taken an online class before, I don’t necessarily think it’s a good idea,” she said. “There’s a lot of schedule variation out there, and a lot of students can’t afford extra fees like that. At the same time, it’s great for the ones that do take a lot of online classes.”
The Board of Regents will make a decision at Friday’s meeting. The meeting will be held in Roberts Room in Scholes Hall from 9 a.m. until noon.
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Jyllian Roach is the editor-in-chief at the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at editorinchief@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @Jyllian_R.
Denicia Aragon is a freelance reporter for the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at news@dailylobo.com or on Twitter @DailyLobo.
