Undergraduate tuition, fees to rise for upcoming academic year

James Glaser, dean of the School of Arts and Sciences, and Jianmin Qu, dean of the School of Engineering, sent out an email update to Tufts undergraduate students on April 12, detailing the projected increased tuition and fees for the 2016-17 academic year in an effort to help family financial planning.

Undergraduate tuition will increase by $1,784 to $51,304. After factoring in room, board and other fees, the overall cost per student will be $65,996, an increase of 3.6 percent.

“The university engages in careful planning to keep tuition as affordable as possible for our students and their families,” Glaser and Qu wrote in the email.

While the university has not sent out emails explaining such tuition increases in the past, Qu explained that he and Glaser decided to send out an update about this matter for the first time.

“In setting the tuition and other costs, Tufts looks closely at what resources are needed to deliver the kind of educational experience that our students expect,” Qu wrote in an email to the Daily. “We do our best to control the costs. But many factors are beyond our control.”

According to Glaser, the university budget for the upcoming year has already been set, which includes a significant increase in financial aid.

"The financial aid budget has increased at a much higher rate than the tuition rate over the past decade," he wrote in an email to the Daily.

According to Glaser, this aid increase allows Tufts to provide students with the best possible education.

“A diverse student body — diverse on many different dimensions — enables students to learn from each other,” he said. “In order to increase financial aid, we have to control our costs and sometimes decide that we can’t do certain things. This is one of the biggest challenges of our jobs as deans.”

According to Paul Tringale, secretary of the corporation in the Tufts Office of the Trustees, this tuition increase was the smallest possible option.

“Our trustees review all of the factors identified by the deans and senior administrative leadership and approve the smallest possible tuition increase that allows the university to achieve its long- and short-term goals,” Tringale wrote in an email to the Daily.