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Health & Fitness

Speaker's Briefing: Time for UW System to Put Students First

State Representative Robin Vos proposes a tuition freeze and audit of the UW System accounting practices after massive reserves were discovered.

I’m State Representative Robin Vos and this is the Speaker’s Briefing.

Late last week we learned that the University of Wisconsin System has hundreds of millions of dollars in reserve funds, basically a surplus of tuition dollars. Between 2002 and 2012, tuition went up 134% in for UW System students, more than at any other school in the Big Ten. At a time when student loan debt is soaring, the UW System did their students a disservice by not being more responsible with the tuition dollars they had, and asking for more.

The Legislature will take a serious look at the needs of the universities to make sure that students are put first. To do that, we’re going to take a comprehensive look at the UW System’s finances, and examine some reforms to bring about more accountability and transparency.

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There has been a pattern of disingenuous behavior from UW System officials. On one hand, President Reilly testified yesterday that they didn’t know the balances existed, and yet they had a plan in place to spend it. That’s disrespectful to the students whose tuition was repeatedly raised while the system was sitting on big reserves. 

This is an issue that deserves further examination. At a minimum I can assure parents and students that we will freeze tuition for two years across the UW System. This is just the beginning of an investigation of the UW System's finances that will ensure that every aspect of Wisconsin government is responsible to the people. 

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