University Times

An $830.7 million Pitt fiscal year 1995-96 budget was approved by the Board of Trustees executive committee July 27.

No salary raises for faculty and staff are budgeted for the fiscal year, which began July 1. However, Pitt administrators said they will attempt to provide a "modest" salary increase for lower paid employees in January, using funds recovered through several new salary control programs.

Under the budget, tuition for Pennsylvania full-time undergraduate students rises this year from $4,962 to $5,184, an increase of $222 or 4.5 percent, in the College of Arts and Sciences, College of General Studies, the schools of dental medicine, education and social work, and at the Bradford, Greensburg and Johnstown campuses.

Tuition for Pennsylvania full-time students in the School of Engineering and in the Johnstown campus Engineering Technical Program remains at the current $6,316. The three-term tuition for the EMBA/Flex program will remain at $15,900 until January 1997.

Full-time tuition rates in other undergraduate schools, graduate programs and other first professional programs rise by 4.5 percent, except at the medical school, where the increase is 3.5 percent. For in-state and out-of-state part-time students, tuition rises by 4.5 percent, except for medicine, where the increase is 3.5 percent.

Pitt's budget includes a $144.1 million commonwealth appropriation, with an additional $3.2 million expected to be earned through the state's Tuition Challenge Grant Program. The program rewards state-funded universities for keeping tuition increases to a specified percentage — 4.5 percent this year.

University administrators pointed out that Pitt's tuition increases are in line with those at competing schools.