The Board of Regents heard proposals for increases in room and board rates at the three state schools during their meeting in Ames last week. Iowa State University is proposing a two-point-four percent increase. Residence Department director Peter Englin says record enrollment increases have leveled off, and they are also seeing outside competition for students. “We have seen some leveling of enrollment, we have seen some leveling of demand,” Englin says. “Students ultimately kind of vote with their feet and we are currently in our recontracting process and we are seeing some of the impact of off-campus offerings. They are very aggressive in their marking and communications.”  He says they are working to let students know what they have to offer. “We’re spending time with our students kind of learning how can we make sure they understand that we’re the place where they can be more successful. G-P-A’s for all four cohorts for students who live on campus are higher,” Englin says.

The residence and dinning program “Apart from three residence halls, the other 17 are at least 50 and 60 years old — some as old as 100 years old,” Englin says. He says the upgrades planned include new windows, L-E-D lighting, luxury vinyl plank flooring and then major renovation around restrooms.  The cost for a double-occupancy room at I-S-U would go from eight-thousand-517 dollars to eight-thousand-720 ($8,720). The executive director of the residence department at the University of Northern Iowa, Glenn Gray, says one-third of students live in university housing on the Cedar Falls campus. “This year that includes 92 percent of our new freshman and 87 percent of all freshman. Forty-five percent of our sophomores, 23 percent of our juniors, 16 percent of our seniors and five percent of our graduate students,” Gray says.

He is proposing the smallest increase in room and board rates of the three schools. He says the rates are proposed to increase from one percent to one-point-nine percent, or 167 dollars next year depending on the plan selected. The leader of the University of Iowa’s Housing program, Von Stange, is asking for a two-point-seven (2.7) percent increase. He says a smaller incoming class has had an impact on their operation. “Now the smaller first year class size combined with the opening of Elizabeth Cattlett Residence Hall — which we opened in the fall of ’17 — put us in a situation where we have had empty beds. We opened with empty beds for the first time in two decades,” Stange says. He says have more space meant they didn’t have to put students in temporary housing and were able to make other adjustments. “We were able to de-triple nearly every room in the residence hall system, and we were able to affect room change requests earlier than we ever have before,” Stange says. “And finally, we were able to provide single rooms to nearly every student who wanted them.”

Stange says they’ve worked to cut internal costs and to seek out new sources of revenue. “We’re marketing our meal plans to off-campus students. It’s the first time we’ve been able to do that because previously our dinning operations were at or over capacity, so we couldn’t really do that,” Stange explains. “We are also engaging our current students and encouraging them to live in the residence halls for longer than the first year.”

The average cost of a double-occupancy room at the U-I will go from 10-thousand-15 dollars to 10-thousand-284 dollars. The Board of Regents won’t vote on the approval of the proposals until they approve the overall budget. Student Regent, Rachael Johnson, asked that a report on the total cost of attending the schools that includes room and board along with tuition be presented to the board as part of the budget discussions.

(Radio Iowa)