URI, RIC increasing tuition following promised freeze

March 27, 2018 6:36 pm

By: Rebecca Turco

Email: rturco@abc6.com

WARWICK, R.I. (WLNE) – Tuition rates are going up this fall at the University of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College.

Last week, the Council on Postsecondary Education unanimously approved a two-percent increase to the Fiscal Year 2019 tuitions of the public four-year schools. That equates to $246 for URI resident undergraduates and $153 for RIC in-state students.

The Council had already approved a 2.5-percent increase to URI out-of-state undergraduates in the fall of 2017.

Previously, there was a tuition freeze at RIC and a freeze for in-state URI students.

According to documents obtained from the Council on Postsecondary Education, the schools requested the revisions based on the proposed budget under consideration by the General Assembly. The tuition increases will bring an estimated $2-million in net revenue to URI and $800,000 to RIC.

The governor says she has worked hard to keep tuition at state schools affordable. "They need to manage better,” she told reporters Tuesday. “Families are really struggling to pay the bills for college.”

State Republicans are pointing the finger at Governor Gina Raimondo’s Rhode Island Promise program, which provides residents free tuition to the Community College of Rhode Island. That program has a budget of $3-million in its first year and a $6.4-million budget for fiscal year 2019.

"It can’t be free,” explained Rep. Mike Chippendale (R – Foster, Coventry, Glocester), “We will pay for it in one way or another."

"It’s simply a transference of that [free tuition] cost from CCRI and the students who will be able to take advantage of it over to other state colleges, where students already are enrolled and will now pay more," Chippendale said.

Now, Rhode Island GOP Party Chairman Brandon Bell is calling on Speaker Nicholas Mattiello to end the Rhode Island Promise program. He released a statement, saying in part: “Let’s not make college free for some, by making it costlier for others.”