NEWS RELEASE

For immediate release: Monday, February 4, 2002

NYPIRG CALLS ON GOVERNOR TO BOOST AID TO NEEDY STUDENTS

New U.S. Department of Education figures show that average tuition and fees charged by New York State’s senior public colleges are the 14th most expensive in the nation, exceeding the national average, California, Florida, and Texas. New York’s community colleges, according to the federal government, have the fifth highest tuition and fees charges in the nation. Over the past decade, New York’s public college tuition and fees have risen a staggering 156 percent.

These data are particularly daunting considering Governor Pataki’s 2002-03 higher education budget, which cuts $155 million in funding from the Tuition Assistance Program (TAP), caps awards at 66 percent, and flat lines spending at the State University of New York (SUNY) and the City University of New York (CUNY).

"It is ironic that tuition and fees are skyrocketing as state funding to financial aid and our public colleges is dropping," said Miriam Kramer, NYPIRG’s Higher Education Project Director. "This means that students are getting shortchanged: they are paying much more and getting much less."

In addition, the Governor’s proposed changes to TAP exacerbate the fact that financial aid does not keep pace with the rise in tuition and fees. Under the proposal, students will receive two-thirds of their awards while at school and the remaining one-third if they graduate. Since academic year 1990-91, TAP’s minimum grant increased by 21 percent, neither matching the drastic rise in tuition and fees nor inflation. As students receive less of their awards and the gap between tuition and fees and student aid increases, New Yorkers will have to shell out more and more money to fund their own or their dependents’ higher education.

NYPIRG urges the Governor to boost aid to needy students and to amend his TAP proposal and increase funding for our state’s public colleges. "Students deserve more assistance while they’re in school and not more debt, paperwork, and frustration," said Camille Rivera, Chairperson of NYPIRG’s student Board of Directors and CUNY Queens College student.