The recent ticket price increase is why I posted this article in this category.This is very interesting in the timing of this article.

Notice that I highlighted in bold, the paragraph about football expenses.



FAU named most costly state university

By Jennifer Peltz
Staff Writer
Posted March 13 2004

What's Florida's priciest public university? The flagship University of Florida, with its Spanish moss-curtained campus, 49,000 students and extensive roster of research? New College, the small, selective school that promises the likes of a private liberal-arts college at state university prices?

Nope. It's Boca Raton-based Florida Atlantic University, according to a recent state analysis that compared the 11 state universities' tuition and certain common fees.


At FAU, they total $2,448 a year for an in-state undergraduate taking a full-time load of 24 credits, according to the state Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability. The same student would pay $2,224 for the same expenses at UF, the oversight agency found.

FAU isn't on top by much. The University of Central Florida clocks in at $2,410, and the full range amounts to a difference of only about $300. Furthermore, the comparison excludes some major costs like campus housing.

Still, some trustees lamented FAU's first-place finish at a meeting Friday. As vice chairwoman Sherry Plymale put it, "I would just love to see us be under somebody."

And to trustee and math professor Frederick Hoffman, the difference between what FAU gets paid and what FAU pays doesn't add up.

As of last year, many FAU faculty members made less than did 80 percent of their colleagues nationwide. Trustees are putting $1.5 million into faculty and staff raises this year, and they've pledged to raise faculty salaries further over the next two years.

"Still," Hoffman said, "it leaves a bad taste in my mouth to see that we have low-paid faculty, and our students pay more for that than anyone else in the state."

Some students, though, don't find fault with the ranking.

"I think that students who take advantage of all the resources and opportunities available to them are definitely getting their money's worth out of [FAU]," said Ancel Pratt III, student government president.

Tuition and some fees are the same statewide. The differences come down to fees for sports, transportation, health care and student activities and services.

A full-time in-state undergrad at FAU pays $282 a year to support its three-year-old football team and other sports, for example.

At UF, where powerhouse teams can tap television and other revenues, that student would pay about $45 a year for athletics.

But student activity and service fees also are higher at FAU than at some bigger universities more known for school spirit: $240 a year for a full-time FAU undergrad versus $196 at UF, for instance.

Student services aren't just theme parties and club meetings, adds Pratt.

FAU's $5.8 million a year in activity and service fees also pay for a used book exchange, child care discounts, and even free coffee on some campuses.