Stony Brook University has reversed its controversial decision to charge its new $37.50 Academic Excellence and Success fee for the Fall semester.
A message sent to Stony Brook students through SOLAR on Thursday said that the fee, which would be applied to students’ tuition bills beginning with the current semester, “will help bring the university much-needed resources to strengthen our academic programs in many ways, including improving the student-faculty ratio, providing timely access to classes needed for graduation, and creating new opportunities for students to work directly with some of the very best professors in the nation.”
The announcement that the university would apply the charge to students’ Fall semester tuition, which took place only a week before the close of the semester, seems to have either been a mistake or a decision that the university regretted upon receiving student complaints. This post will be updated when the university becomes available for comment.
Undergraduate Student Government President Mark Maloof took issue with the fee being charged for the Fall semester, though he did not oppose the fee itself.
“The Fall semester is over and students will not be able to take advantage of what the Fall Fee would have provided,” Maloof said in an e-mail. ”The students are retroactively paying but cannot retroactively receive the benefits.”
The contents of the message announcing the retraction of the original version of the policy, which is available on SOLAR, are posted below.
A message to all Stony Brook University students:
Please disregard any new charges on the fall bill reflecting an Academic Excellence and Success fee of $37.50 and out-of-state tuition associated with the implementation of Stony Brook University’s NY SUNY 2020 plan.
The next bill you receive for the spring 2012 semester will reflect the new charges. We regret any inconvenience this has caused, and if a payment has already been made, the University will implement a credit balance to the Spring semester bill.
Please call the Student Accounts Office at (631) 632-2455 with any questions about your account and we will be happy to assist you; or visit www.stonybrook.edu/bursar.
Student Accounts
Stony Brook University
And they are not done yet, just wait until the Fall 2012 when you will be hit with another fee for the New Recreation Center.
GSO October 11, 2011 meeting minutes:
The Associate Dean and Director of Student Life – Dr. Susan Dimonda’s report concerning the New Recreation Center
● The New Recreation Center is expected to be opened next to the Student Union in fall 2012.
● A $75 fee per semester will be required to finance the costs of the recreation center and only Stony Brook University students will have permission to use it. Although this $75 fee was voted for undergraduate students, no fee has been established for grad students yet. The graduate students’ fee can be paid in two ways:
A fixed fee per semester or an individual basis with plans to be announced in the future. We will vote on these two options.
● The report by Dr. Susan Dimonda provides detailed information about the plan of the New Recreation Center.
http://sbgso.org/files/u1/reports/2011_October.pdf
Who voted for the undergraduate students to pay the $75.00 fee?