I’m a Student, Not a Cash-Flow

By Mike Degen

The first time I drove through the UAF campus a banner caught my eye: You belong here. The sign was welcoming. I’d just driven across the country from New Jersey, and I’d finally arrived at my new home. I continued to feel this positive sentiment on my first day of orientation, when I was welcomed by a professor who went out of her way to make me and other members of my cohort feel like we belonged in a new space. My first memories at the university were extremely positive and I’d like to thank her for that. 

During orientation, I received an email that there was an unpaid balance of almost $1000 dollars on my account. I was confused, as I thought that my payments were sorted out. I went to the Bursar’s office and discovered that I’d been charged a consolidated fee. This fee was a package of surprises that I didn’t know I had to pay for. The consolidated fee includes fees for student government, recreation, the health center, as well as student activities and services. 

Being a student is hard on a bank account, as is moving to a new place. Costs include security deposits on rent, transportation costs, and move-in costs, which, altogether, can total several thousand dollars. Other costs for students include tuition, rent, and food. Students need to pay for every aspect of their education in one way or another. 

It makes sense that students have to pay tuition because universities have costs such as facilities, salaries for all staff, research, student services, among others. Over time, because of inflation, the costs of running a university have increased. However, universities around the country are guilty of raising tuition (and fee) prices at a far greater rate than inflation. A 2022 report by U.S News and World Report claims that college prices have jumped 134% over the last 20 years (1).  

At the same time, endowments, which are funds colleges and universities receive from donors, have also increased. According to the University of Alaska Foundation website, UAF has an endowment of more than $375M (as of 2021) (2). This endowment is not only for the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, but also the other campuses as well. It’s important to note that this sizeable amount of money can’t all be spent at once, but it’s there to be spent over time. 

Still, that observation aside, the university has a lot of money coming in. Naturally, I started to wonder: where’s all this money going? 

As a public institution, the university’s budget can be found online. After crawling through the budget, I was surprised by some of my findings. Looking at the 2022 Operating Budget (3), I found that there were no salary increases for UA staff or adjuncts. According to the Alaskan Graduate Workers Association (AGWA), there has only been one increase in graduate student salaries at UAF since 2007 (4).

Yet, the university has consistently increased tuition, fees, and housing. The cost-of-living crisis has gotten so bad that graduate students can no longer afford to live on campus. One graduate student in the English department told me that she pays $1275 for rent (she lives on campus). Her graduate stipend pays her $1242 per month. So essentially, the university pays her to teach, and she has to give all that money right back to the university in the form of rent, and then some! This isn’t even including the cost of food each month, which is another several hundred dollars. The bottom line is this: the university does not pay its graduate students enough to even feed themselves.  

The university talks a lot about equity, and I was curious if administrators were also close to the poverty line. I was shocked to discover that there many administrators make over $200,000 per year.

The pay of administrators seemed odd to me given that they continued to preach about equity through the first few weeks of class. Things don’t feel equitable when they make over $5000 a week and I needed to go into debt to attend school. I expressed concerns about my ability to afford school over the week of orientation. One staff member encouraged me to take out loans while another pointed me in the direction of the food bank. 

My frustration culminated on the last day of orientation, where all the new grad students went to a session. One administrator encouraged us to be happy. She said she understood the plight of graduate students, as she’d been one too. It’s easy to tell someone else to be happy when you’re making significantly more than them. 

While the administration is seemingly getting wealthier, students are getting poorer. According to Forbes, 7% of students will never be able to pay back their loans (5) and there are over $1.6 billion of public student loans in the US (6). 

I spoke with the director of financial aid, Ashley Munro, to learn more about aid, which can be a confusing term to students. Financial aid comes in different forms including scholarships, grants, and loans. Ashley gave me a printed handout of the breakdown of the amount of financial aid offered to students. In total, students received $33.8M in aid last school year. This included over $13M of scholarships, $7M in grants, and $12M in loans. 

If students have any questions about these loans, they can visit the financial aid office or attend one of the financial literacy workshops put on by the financial aid office. 

While financial aid helps students, it doesn’t seem fair that administrators are making several hundred thousand dollars a year while students are going into debt. I believe that moving forward, we need to educate ourselves on the costs of education, as well as where that money is going. The University of Alaska Fairbanks is an institution of higher learning. Unfortunately, its current budget seems more similar to that of a corporation.

With all this in mind I can’t help but wonder: How can an institution that claims to want to improve the lives of students fail to alleviate the financial burden placed on them? 

Sources: (1) US News and World Report (2) UAF Endowment (3) Budget (4) AGWA (5) Forbes (6) Forbes