While tuition at Morton Community College has increased by about 5 percent three times in the past few years, this year the college’s board is considering a hike double that amount.

The finance committee’s recommendation of an 11.5 percent tuition raise means students would pay $7 more per credit hour beginning this fall semester. But the board decided at Wednesday’s board of trustees meeting to vote on the proposed hike later.

Board President Fran Reitz said the board wants to first look into the college’s spending, compare Morton’s tuition with surrounding community colleges and consider the consequences of a hike.

“It’s a big step to increase tuition $7 when we’ve been increasing it $3 dollars,” Reitz said.

If approved, the tuition price of $61 per credit hour would raise to $68.

Meanwhile, the school’s current expenses increased by only 6 percent.

Morton College President Brent Knight said the proposed 11.5 percent tuition hike is disproportionate to the school’s expense increase partly because the state “does not contribute what it should.”

The state is contributing 2 percent toward the college’s 6-percent cost increase.

Property taxes, fixed at 2 percent, will also go toward the increased expenses.
The state gives only two-thirds of the “ideal amount,” Reitz said.

“The state should give more,” Knight said. “We don’t like it that tuition keeps going up disproportionately. If this trend continues, there’s going to be more and more people who can’t afford it.”

Cicero resident Julio Robles, 19, who’s finishing his first year at Morton College, said he’s already having a hard time affording tuition. He works part time at JC Penny in North Riverside Mall for $7.25 an hour. He said that job allows him to pay for some of his tuition but he needs his parents to help pick up the rest of his college costs.

“And we don’t really have any more money for new clothes or going out to eat,” Robles said. He said seven more dollars per credit-hour is “a lot when you can’t buy anything else.”

But Arubey Diaz, 24, who said she earns a decent salary, said the tuition hike won’t make much of a difference to her and that Morton is still cheaper than other colleges she’s looked into.

Diaz, also from Cicero, earned an associate’s degree at the college but returned to take more classes to transfer into a four-year school.

“I’m still here because I can afford it here — and can’t afford other places yet,” Diaz said.

A full schedule for a semester is typically comprised of about 15 credit-hours. So full-time students would pay at least $100 more a semester.

The proposal has been moved to the agenda of the college’s next board of trustees meeting on May 10.