With the passing of the 2014-2015 fiscal budget, Elon University reaffirmed its commitment to a slow growth model, increasing tuition by 3.69 percent and bringing the total cost of an Elon education to $41,914 per year for students living on campus. Students living off campus can expect to pay $30,848.

Gerald Whittington, senior vice president for business, finance and technology, said part of the problem is the university’s endowment, currently valued at $183 million. Though the university plans to triple it by 2020, the funds still pale in comparison to schools such as the University of Richmond — one of Elon’s main competitors — which boasts an endowment valued at just over $2 billion.

“There are certainly some challenges to being a tuition-dependent institution,” Whittington said. “If you’re growing slowly instead of really fast, you can get a double effect of covering the cost of education because you grew some and the tuition rate went up some.”

Whittington said a 4 percent increase is a “line in the sand” that media outlets have publicized as being too much. Over the last four years, Elon has kept its tuition increases below the line.

But Gabriel Noble, a senior who was almost unable to graduate due to cost, asked when the university should stop expanding and settle for what is here now: a “perfect campus.” Thanks to a Change.org petition, Noble will graduate this spring through donor contributions and grants.

“I know they have to raise the tuition for everything they’re adding on,” he said. “When I got here, Elon was enough for me to be happy for my whole four years. At what point does the administration decide we’re good — we don’t need more? At what point do they stop expanding?”

Growing slowly in terms of students, tuition

As a private institution, Elon does not differentiate between in-state or out-of-state tuition rates. For the 2014-2015 fiscal year, the North Carolina Board of Governors has proposed no increase for in-state students, but out-of-state students are facing a 12 percent increase in fees.

An email sent by President Leo Lambert emphasized that Elon’s tuition continues to fall below the national average and is almost $10,000 lower than most universities in the Northeast.

“I wasn’t surprised by the increase,” freshman Katie Quick said. “I assumed it would increase each year, and the increase wasn’t a lot compared to other schools in the area. Elon’s tuition isn’t that bad to start with compared to schools up North.”

But junior Connor Cavanaugh said he hasn’t seen much in return for the tuition increases hurting his wallet.

“This is my third year here, and it’s gone up every year,” he said. “With all the increases, I haven’t seen a difference in the quality of the university and the experiences I’ve had here.”

 The cost of expansion

Elon ranks in the top 8 percent in size among private universities. As the university grows, the administration is taking care to ensure Elon has enough resources and space for everyone on campus.

Elon aims to increase enrollment by about 100 students this fall.

“We are not a small school anymore, but we are looking to grow slowly so that we will not feel crowded,” said Steven House, vice president of academic affairs and provost at Elon.

But freshman Elena Sparacio said she is concerned the university will run out of space for students who want to live on campus.

“I worry it’s going to be crowded with more freshmen on campus next year,” Sparacio said. “They’ll need to build more housing.”

On average, 300 students are off campus studying abroad or interning in a given semester. House said increased study abroad opportunities, along with the new Global Neighborhood will hopefully free up space for the incoming freshmen.

The school plans to add 400,000 square feet of new buildings in the next few years, including the Global Neighborhood buildings, a new School of Communications and an admissions welcome center. The budget also allocates funds for renovations in the Historic Neighborhood in the coming years.

Elon’s Writing Excellence Initiative will receive major funding from the 2014-2015 budget.  More freshman English classes will be offered to reduce class sizes, and the Writing Center will be renovated and expanded.

Pay increases to reward promising professors

House said in order to prevent increasing class sizes, the university plans to hire 16 new full-time faculty members. This should maintain the 12-to-1 student-faculty ratio and help the university reach its goal of no more than 15 percent part-time faculty members.

The largest portion of the 2014-2015 budget will go toward professor pay increases. Professors’ raises will depend on performance evaluations — typically one a seemster.

“We want to reward the best professors we have here at Elon by offering them a financial incentive to stay,” House said.

Funding for study abroad programs and undergraduate research will also increase in an effort to connect faculty members with students.

“We are committed to small class sizes. We have a teacher-scholar-mentor model, which means we have to give professors time for scholarship and the resources to mentor students. Elon cares about close personal relationships between faculty and students. In order to do that we have to fund the Elon Experiences,” House said.

 The cloud: computing from behind the scenes

Though class sizes and professor salaries can be measured in definite terms, the increases to tuition will also go toward behind-the-scenes technological advancement — that which can’t be so easily seen with the naked eye, Whittington said.

“A lot of the technology you don’t see is behind the wall,” he said. “We’re having to make some significant improvements behind the wall. You turn on the light switch, and the lights come on, but you don’t think about the process.”

Just as students don’t think about how the lights turn on, Whittington said, neither do they consider the jumble of wires and electrical impulses that allow them to surf the Web or check their email. The university plans to expedite that process even more by increasing bandwidth speeds to 100 megabytes per second (mbps) over the next several years.

One-hundred mbps per second is the fastest publicly-available speed, save Google Fiber, a blazing fast fiber-optic service that may be coming to the Triangle soon, according to a report released last week by the technological market heavyweight.

Whittington said he would be thrilled by the possibility of bringing Google Fiber to campus, but in the meantime, the university plans to act where it can: cloud computing. He said the university plans to gradually migrate its servers to the cloud, with physical storage spaces spread out in several locations from Raleigh to Chicago.

The fiscal reality of financial aid

Ideally, Whittington said, any student from the lower class to the upper echelon who qualifies academically should be able to come to Elon, but that’s just not a fiscal reality, given the endowment’s size. House and Whittington both said the largest portion of the incoming funds from the tuition hike should go to financial aid, particularly need-based aid.

“That would really help those who are in the middle class who otherwise couldn’t even think about coming to a private institution like Elon University,” Whittington said.

A “country club” approach to amenities over academics may hinder the future of the institution, Noble said. Though the senior praised Elon for providing him with a quality education, he said it could be improved.

“I think Elon does its best to provide the best academic atmosphere possible,” Noble said. “I’m a much better person and a student because of that, but why do we need to place a coffee machine in the library when most people can make their own? If these amenities are at the expense of students coming in, then it’s really not right.”