Student Publications
University of Houston
151C Communications Bldg
Houston, TX 77204-4015
713.743.5350

©1991-2007
Student Publications,
All rights reserved.

Last modified:

Contact:
ktruitt@uh.edu

News

UH reconsiders late registration fee

Students who don't pay on time will still be dropped from classes, charged $20

by KIM THAI
The Daily Cougar

A $100 late registration fee that was supposed to be implemented in the fall will be postponed after vocal opposition from the Student Government Association and more than 2,100 students who were informed of the fee through a Facebook group. 

"After conferring with various representatives of the UH administration and with our student leaders, we believe it is in everyone's best interest to defer charging this fee for the upcoming semester," Provost Donald Foss said in a prepared statement. 

The fee was originally part of a new late registration procedure drafted on March 23 that required students to complete the registration process for Fall 2007 before Aug. 14. Otherwise students would be dropped from their classes and charged a $100 fee to re-enroll, Director of Student Financial Services Gene Gillis said. 

If students do not complete the registration process ? either by paying their tuition in full or opting for an installment payment plan ? they will still be "zapped" from their classes and un-enrolled. Students have two business days to address the issue. 

The new procedure still requires students to register before the semester begins because of stipulations in the Texas State Education Code, but a $20 late fee and un-enrollment for nonpayment are the only remaining consequences from the original draft. 

"(SGA executives) have convinced me that the statement of ‘you have to pay or you will lose your place in class' is a dramatic enough consequence for students to pay," Foss said during an interview. "I thought the government student leaders did a good job to call it to my attention. They've made a good point. I accept their point. (But) I reserve the right to re-evaluate that after the fall term."

Foss said he believes the original reasoning for the fee increase was to encourage students to complete the enrollment process on time.

Currently, any student who registers after the initial due date is penalized with a $20 fee, which can be paid through a loan or paid up front if the student had paid 100 percent of his or her tuition and fee bill. This policy will remain, Foss said. 

Foss, SGA President David Rosen and Vice President Sam Dike said their discussions over the change in the late registration fee is evidence that the administration and the student body can work together to benefit the University. 

"I think the events of the past week-and-a-half is living proof that shared governance is alive and well at the University," Rosen said. "I really do believe that too many times, a lot of the issues that we face are framed as an ‘us versus them' type of thing. We can accomplish a lot of things when we work with the students and the administration." 

The current late registration policy has been in existence for more than 40 years, Gillis said, but the application of the process has been changed so that students will no longer hold classes "hostage" while others are waiting. In previous semesters, between 6,000 to 10,000 students did not complete their registration according to the state requirement; in Spring 2007, more than 7,000 students did not comply, Gillis said. 

Enforcing and changing the late registration procedures are necessary because of the law, for fairness and to help students commit to their education, Foss said. 

"It's important that students be able to sign up for the classes they need," Foss said in the statement. "Allowing the enrollment process to drag on was compromising that. This new approach will prevent classes from being held hostage, as it were, by students who weren't paying on time." 

The SGA passed a resolution Wednesday authored by Rosen condemning the fee on the basis that the administration should have employed different methods other than a fee. 

"We're not going to fight the fact that students have to pay on time ? that's a reasonable request," Rosen said before the fee was postponed. "It will help our graduation rate, and it will help the school with financial planning. But the $100 fee was a kick in the pants when you're already down on the ground. The problem is you're also going to lose your seat. There's already incentive enough. If we don't need the money, then we don't need the fee." 

Repercussions from the state have forced the University to be more strict with the policy. UH and Prairie View A&M are the "only state schools who have not required their students to pay this fee as an upfront fee," Gillis said. 

"The University has lost funding from the state when a class was dropped too late for another student to add the class," Gillis said. "That loss of funding means the University has to make up for the loss in other ways. More than likely it has an effect on what we must then charge for tuition and other fees. And, you, the other students, have lost the opportunity to register for a class you may have needed." 

Foss said he intended to use the money collected from the fee for a scholarship fund. The fee was not changed to be a "money-making operation," Foss said. 

Rosen said it is unreasonable for the University to compare itself to other state colleges and that constantly fining students is not a sensible solution.

"We don't need to look at anyone else's budget when determining our needs and the needs of the people here," Rosen said. "We say we like having a non-traditional body. We say we like being diverse. We say we like having older students here. Then there's this (fee change) that makes it that much harder for at-risk students to attend the University. If we continue increasing, then we're going to hit the glass ceiling of losing our diversity." 

Communication of the changes was also heavily criticized by Rosen and Dike because the original draft was stamped "for UH staff use only." 

Foss said he acknowledges the University should have done a better job of informing students of the change. In the future, Dike said the University should simply talk to student organizations such as SGA and The Daily Cougar when faced with such an issue.

Send comments to dcnews@mail.uh.edu