The Red and Black

Issue date: 12/5/08 Section: Opinions

CONNOR McCARTHY

NICKI BATELLI

Wednesday, a group of Student Government Association representatives attended the Board of Regents' teleconference in Atlanta, during which the Board voted to assess a temporary $100 mandatory fee on students.

Speaking privileges at these meetings are restricted to Board members, as with most executive committees.

In light of our attendance, the Board of Regents office organized a discussion session following the meeting for students from all the University System schools in Georgia. As student representatives, we attended to gain further knowledge on the fee as well as to give as much input as possible.

If you have not already, you will soon be assessed the Special SPR09 Fee of $100 on your student account. Provost Arnett Mace included in his Wednesday e-mail to students that the Special Spring 2009 Fee will be assessed alongside the Technology Fee, which we pay each semester for technology on campus.

The payment deadline for the fee, as well as any other costs on your account balance, has been extended to Jan. 22, 2009. The fee is meant to help recover losses our University is facing due to the state economic crisis.

While institutions of higher education are experiencing an 8 percent cut in their state funding, all state-funded programs - whether in education, health care, transportation or otherwise - are facing similar budget cuts.

The fee will be placed into the University's general operating budget. This portion of the budget primarily funds resident instruction (our professors), which is being cut by $32 million in fiscal year 2009 (July 1, 2008 to June 30, 2009).

Thus, the goal of this fee, as stated by Chancellor Erroll Davis, is "to avoid a decrease in academic quality at our colleges and universities."

Although we now have an additional fee for the spring, the University faculty and staff are also making sacrifices and taking cuts in order to maintain the quality of our education. At Wednesday's meeting, a second decision was made to reduce employer contribution for the PPO and HMO health insurance plans from 75 percent to 70 percent. In all cases, this will result in much higher costs for employees to receive health care benefits.

Although we wish students would have had input in the fee, the decision has been made. Davis has committed, however, to improving communication regarding these actions in the future.

Looking forward, we will work with the administration and the Board of Regents to minimize the effect we, as students, feel from the budget cuts.

To date, our costs have increased by $100; it is important that all of us actively stay aware of the budget cut process.

We have sympathy for our professors and University staff members being affected by these measures and hope the students, faculty, administration and staff can come together and effectively pull through the budget crisis.

Now is a necessary time for creative ideas on how to reduce consumption and cut costs across campus.

If you have any ideas, please e-mail us at ugasga@uga.edu or share them with us at our weekly meetings so we can take a proactive student approach to the budget crisis.

- Connor McCarthy is the president of the Student Government Association, and Nicki Batelli is the vice president.

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