The freeze is on.

Making good on its promise to try to keep costs down, the Board of Governors of the State System of Higher Education voted today not to raise tuition at the 14 state-owned universities for the 1998-99 school year.

The early vote by the Board comes less than a month after passage of the new state budget, which usually doesn’t occur until sometime in June. The Board action means tuition for Pennsylvania residents will remain at $3,468 for at least two more semesters.

It marks the first time since the 1983-84 school year that tuition won’t be going up at the state-owned institutions. It also comes a year after the Board increased tuition by only $100, which, at the time, had been the smallest increase since 1990-91.

The cumulative result of the two actions means that tuition at the System universities will have increased by an average of less than 1.5 percent a year over two years.

“The top priority of the State System is to provide a quality education to our students at an affordable price,” said Board Chairman F. Eugene Dixon, Jr. “The decision to hold the line on tuition next year is evidence of how seriously the Board takes its responsibility and of its commitment to Pennsylvania students and to their families.

“Our universities will continue to provide affordable access to higher education and opportunity for a successful future to all residents of the Commonwealth.”

By freezing tuition, the Board will require System universities to trim their proposed budgets for the next fiscal year by a combined $8 million in order to make them balance. That will amount to a total reduction of less than 1 percent.

The Board of Governors last fall promised not to increase tuition if the System received a state appropriation of $435 million for the 1998-99 fiscal year, an increase of $30.3 million. It actually will receive about $10 million less than that, but the Board decided to stick with the zero increase and will seek to make up the difference through a series of cost savings already realized and the additional spending reductions.

The System’s overall educational and general budget will climb to around $870 million in ’98-’99, an increase of about 2.5 percent instead of the 3.9 percent increase that had been planned.

“Our universities have been and will continue to be actively engaged in a variety of efforts to control costs,” said State System Chancellor James H. McCormick. “We have been involved in a continuous improvement program, whereby we are always looking at ways of doing things better and at less cost. Under the direction of our Board of Governors, the System also has embarked on a Systemic Change Initiative designed to further improve both the quality and cost-effectiveness of our institutions.”

System universities will be asked to reduce their ’98-’99 proposed budgets by varying amounts, depending on several factors, including the size of each of the institutions. It is possible some of the institutions may be able to make up at least a portion of any projected shortfall through increased revenues resulting from increased enrollments.

Officials already were projecting a slight enrollment increase across the System, but those numbers could go even higher as a result of the tuition freeze. By holding the line on tuition, the Board hopes more Pennsylvania students will choose to enroll at System universities.

Several of the universities also hope to attract more out-of-state students through a new policy that allows them to lower their nonresident tuition rate, if they can show that by doing so they actually will increase their overall revenue. As a result, nonresident tuition at the institutions next year will range from $5,202 to $8,824.

Resident tuition is uniform across the System. Room and board rates and required fees are determined by each institution’s council of trustees, and vary from campus to campus. The average cost of attending a System university this year, including tuition, room and board and all required fees, was slightly more than $8,000. Students spent, on average, another $600 for books and supplies.

The State System of Higher Education comprises 14 universities throughout the Commonwealth and is the largest provider of higher education in the state. One of every 29 Pennsylvanians is attending or is a graduate of a System university. The State System is the 17^th largest employer in the state, with more than 11,700 employees.

The 14 state-owned universities are Bloomsburg, California, Cheyney, Clarion, East Stroudsburg, Edinboro, Indiana, Kutztown, Lock Haven, Mansfield, Millersville, Shippensburg, Slippery Rock and West Chester Universities of Pennsylvania. The System also operates branch campuses in Clearfield, Kittanning, Oil City and Punxsutawney and several regional centers.