The approval of increases in fees is rushed, according to some student leaders and administrators, and now, a proposal to elongate the process and make some changes is in the works.
According to Vice Chancellor for Finance and Business Charles Leffler, there is always a crunch to get through the fees process to decide how much to increase or decrease certain fees and make sure each group has a fair hearing.
“We’ve always been crunched because it takes a series of meetings of these two committees [tuition and fees] to do their work … and then come together,” he said.
Zach Adams, last year’s Student Senate President, sat on the fees committee last year.
“I feel like last year’s fee process was extremely rushed,” Adams, a senior in industrial engineering, said. “There was such limited time to approving the fee proposal. I didn’t feel like students would be able to give enough input to the process.”
Leffler said he is not sure if the proposal will work out.
“I am less optimistic that we’re going to have that extra time now,” Leffler said.
Adams disagreed.
“If we can stick to the proposed new timeline, I feel like we will have a much more informed and careful process,” he said. “From my point of view, I don’t see any reason why the timeline couldn’t work.