REGENTS MAY HIKE ROOM, BOARD CHARGES, FEES

Students can expect to pay more to get an education at Southeast Missouri State University in the coming school year.

But school officials insist the price is right, as reflected by increased occupancy rates in the campus residence halls.

Dr. Ken Dobbins, Southeast president, said the school expects few vacancies in its 12 residence halls when classes commence this fall.

"We'll have almost 100 percent occupancy," he said Thursday.

Some students will depart during the course of the year. Still, Dobbins said Southeast projects the residence halls will house about 2,161 students for the school year, a 93 percent occupancy rate.

Dobbins said that's a major improvement over three or four years ago when the occupancy rate was less than 80 percent

Dobbins said the higher occupancy rate reflects the fact that more students are enrolling at Southeast.

Renovations to Towers and Greek Housing residence halls have helped attract students, as have improved computer labs and an expanded Student Recreation Center, he said.

Loren Rullman, director of student auxiliary services, said students are willing to pay higher charges for more and better services.

"They don't want cheap. They want to know they are getting value for what they spend," he said.

Students can expect to pay more for everything from classes to room and board in the 2000-2001 school year.

The Board of Regents is slated to vote today on raising room and board charges, and student fees.

The regents are scheduled to meet at 1 p.m. in the University Center Ballroom.

An in-state undergraduate student living on campus and taking 24 credit-hours of classes in the fall and spring semesters combined could pay more than $8,300 for room and board charges, tuition and general fees

The university administration has proposed hiking tuition or incidental fees by $4 a credit-hour for in-state undergraduates and by $8 for out-of-state students. The increase would be twice that amount for graduate students.

The administration has proposed hiking room charges by about $200 on average. The new charges will range from $3,690 in Towers North and West residence halls to $2,550 in Dearmont.

Southeast plans to install a second phone line in each room in Towers South and Towers East and the Greek Housing units.

The added phone lines will allow students to use the Internet without tying up their regular phone lines, officials said.

The Greek Housing room rate is scheduled to increase by nearly $500, reflecting recent renovations to those residence halls.

Meal charges are slated to increase about $105 on average. Under the proposal, students would pay $1,721 a year on average for board charges. At the high end, students would pay $1,977 for a new, unlimited meal plan.

Rullman said the new meal plan is part of continuing efforts to improve the campus food service.

"The unlimited meal plan is what I call the open refrigerator," he said.

Students won't be limited to three meals a day in the Towers cafeteria, which is open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. "You can go in and out as many times as you want. This basically allows them to eat all day if they want," said Rullman.

Chartwells, the company that operates the campus food service, plans to renovate the Towers dining center into a food court this summer. The project is slated to be completed by August.

Southeast plans to spend $3.2 million on its food service contract in fiscal 2001. The fiscal year begins July 1.

Myers Hall will become year-round housing to better accommodate international students and other students who don't go home for the summer.

Southeast plans to spend about $500,000 to $600,000 over the next year to renovate Myers Hall. The work will include a new roof and installation of new windows.

Room and board charges are projected to garner $11.26 million in revenue in the coming fiscal year.