DOCUMENTS OF THE GENERAL FACULTY

RESOLUTION IN SUPPORT OF THE CREATION OF AN INFRASTRUCTURE FEE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

Michael H. Granof (professor, accounting) submitted the following resolution on behalf of the Faculty Budget Advisory Committee. The secretary has classified this resolution as general legislation. The Faculty Council will take action on the resolution at its meeting on January 28, 2002.


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John R. Durbin, Secretary
The General Faculty

RESOLUTION IN SUPPORT OF THE CREATION OF AN INFRASTRUCTURE FEE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

The Faculty Council endorses the administration's proposal to create an infrastructure fee to be charged to students beginning with the academic year 2002-2003.

We note that in the past decade The University of Texas revenues have decreased substantially when adjusted for the impact of inflation. Our level of state funding has lagged not only behind our peer institutions throughout the country, but also behind other colleges and universities within Texas. The consequences have been an inability of the University to

• perform routine maintenance and renovation of classrooms, laboratories and other teaching facilities;
• reduce the student-teacher ratio to below what is an unacceptably high level;
• maintain a salary structure that enables us to attract and retain top-notch faculty and staff and keeps us competitive with other universities both within the United States and abroad.

We emphasize that even with the added fees, the tuition and fees charged to our students will be considerably lower than those charged by our peer institutions in other states. We further note that a portion of the fee will be used to cover the additional costs of students in need.

This fee increase will benefit not only the university-at-large, but the students in particular. The economic value of the students' education depends upon the present and future reputation of the institution from which they receive it. The University of Texas cannot expect to achieve its constitutionally mandated objective of becoming a university of the first-class without adequate financial resources.




This legislation was posted on the Faculty Council web site on January 23, 2002. Paper copies are available on request from the Office of the General Faculty, FAC 22, F9500.