Transfer enrollment not expected to vary
Flat rate should have no affect, Ferrari says

Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series of stories examining the impact comprehensive tuition will have on the university.

By Carrie Woodall
Staff Reporter

Although flat-rate tuition is a characteristic of many distinguished schools, the new pricing policy will not affect the number of students who chose to attend community college before coming to TCU, Chancellor Michael Ferrari said last week.

“Based on my experience at a university comparable to TCU with a comprehensive-tuition structure, no significant difference was found (concerning the number of transfer students),” he said.

David Metz, director of transfer admissions, agrees.

“The enrollment number of transfer students will probably remain the same because financial aid has been adjusted to assist incoming transfers proportionately to their need,” he said.

Ferrari said since need-based aid increased proportional to the tuition increase, there is every reason to think that the rate of transfer students will be moderated substantially in the first few transition years.

Metz said that with a change such as the flat rate, everyone may worry about some things because no one knows the future. However, there is no major concern about the affect on transfer students, he said.

In addition, Ferrari said the flat-rate structure should actually encourage students to take less courses in the summer from other schools.

“Some current students take a community college course periodically in the summer because of price or availability of courses,” he said. “Thus, the comprehensive tuition should be a plus for students to avoid the extra fee for another course somewhere else.”

The actual increase in tuition does not put the university in the highest cost range for private institutions and is not the primary issue, he said.
“Private universities like (Southern Methodist University) already are $5,000 more expensive than TCU, and schools like Vanderbilt are $10,000 more at 2000-2001 prices,” he said. “We are hardly moving to the ‘elite’ circle in tuition. The key is, what is the fee, not the structure.”

Ferrari said TCU officials considered the issue of transfer students before moving to a flat-rate tuition.

“We spoke with folks at SMU and other universities to assess their experience with the impact on community college students, and we expect to be able to sustain strong transfer enrollments from these institutions at our projected prices,” he said.

At SMU, approximately eight to 12 percent of about 6,000 undergraduate students are transfer students.

Institutional Research at TCU did not have the information available. However, about 440 of 1,493 of the fall 2000 incoming class are transfer students.

Carrie Woodall
c.d.woodall@student.tcu.edu