“We don’t really micromanage funding,” Associated Students, Inc. President Colombini said. “Everything we put the money down toward must come to us in the form of a proposal. That was one of the biggest reasons people voted against it, because it wasn’t specific enough.”
Shaun Kahmann
Special to Mustang News
The Student Success Fee is set to increase for the final time — from $210 to $260 — next academic year, and a small but powerful committee is planning to allocate the millions of dollars it will bring in.
The Student Success Fee Allocation Advisory Committee (SSFAAC), a little-known but powerful group made up of 11 members, including seven students, will decide how to spend the revenue brought in from the fee for the third time since Fall 2012, the year it was implemented. While the fee amount is based on the higher education price index (HEPI), Associated Students, Inc. (ASI) President Jason Colombini said the upcoming increase represents a planned adjustment established when the fee was originally implemented.
“We’ve been phasing in the fee over the last couple of years, but after the next increase the rise from that point should be in increments of less than $1 per year,” Colombini said.
The Student Success Fee was passed by a 57 percent majority student vote in 2012, and in its first implementation was $160. HEPI is calculated by the Commonfund Institute, and is touted as a consumer price index centered around prices within higher education only. HEPI is projected to rise 2 percent in 2014, outpacing the urban consumer price index, which is more applicable to the general population. The cost of tuition and college expenses have risen by more than 500 percent since 1985 according to the Institute for Higher Education Policy, faster than healthcare, housing and gasoline.
Though increased enrollment numbers brought in revenue in excess of projections, that money will be rolled over into allocations for the next fiscal year, and the increase will go on as planned, Colombini said. The committee exercises control over fee revenue, which totaled $11.2 million last fiscal year and is projected to be $15.2 million in 2014-2015.
According to documents provided by Colombini that are still subject to change, the SSFAAC is planning to allocate an additional $2 million toward increasing access to classes. The SSFAAC doesn’t control precisely how the money is used, but sets agendas for spending based on recommendations made by representatives elected to represent all six academic colleges on the ASI Board of Trustees.
“We don’t really micromanage funding,” Colombini said. “Everything we put the money down toward must come to us in the form of a proposal. That was one of the biggest reasons people voted against it, because it wasn’t specific enough.”
Colombini noted that once a referendum is established on how money will be spent, it’s set in stone. He believes this prevents it from being diverted for purposes other than that which the committee agrees upon.
“Ultimately President (Jeffrey) Armstrong has to approve it and technically has the power to alter it, but there is no precedent for that and he respects the decisions of the committee,” Colombini said.
The committee is currently getting together to discuss where the money will go next year and allocations are still subject to debate. The SSFAAC’s next meeting will be Friday at 8 a.m. in the Julian A. McPhee University Union, room 216. It is open to the public.