DailyMississippian The
thedmonline.com
Monday, April 23, 2012
Vol. 100 No. 290
Winters honored by Ole Universities can waive out-of-state tuition Miss Women’s Council A bill recently passed by the Mississippi legislature allows colleges and universities throughout the state to waive out-of-state tuition for various reasons. Whether each institution actually waives the tuition, however, is at their discretion.
JON HAYWOOD | The Daily Mississippian
Former Gov. William Winter and his wife Elise accept the Legacy Award from Chancellor Dan Jones. The award is given annually by the Ole Miss Women’s Council for Philanthropy.
BY JON HAYWOOD jontarius@gmail.com
Former Mississippi Governor William Winter and his wife Elise Varner Winter received the Legacy Award from the Ole Miss Women’s Council for Philanthropy on Saturday. “It’s one of highest awards we’ve ever had,” Winter said. “To come here to our alma
mater and receive this recognition obviously has special meaning for us.” The Legacy Award, which was presented in the Overby Center for Southern Journalism and Politics and by Chancellor Dan Jones, recognizes the contributions of those who have embodied the council’s goals of philanthropy, leaderSee AWARD, PAGE 3 GRAPHIC BY EMILY ROLAND | The Daily Mississippian
Information for this graphic was pulled from each respective public, four-year institution’s financial aid website. The costs of tuition, both in-state and out-of-state, are from the 2011-12 school year and apply to full-time students taking 12-19 hours per semester.
BY MEGAN SMITH megansmith67@gmail.com
AUSTIN MCAFEE | The Daily Mississippian
Singer and songwriter Gavin DeGraw visited Oxford as part of Student Programing Board’s spring concert in the Grove. A rain downpour resulted in the power going off during one of his early songs. DeGraw came back on stage when the weather calmed down, but didn’t get through his whole set.
Out-of-state students may have more reason to come to Mississippi after high school in the next few years. The state legislature recently passed a bill that will allow Mississippi universities and colleges to waive out-of-state tuition. Each institution will determine its own waiver policy. Bill 1095 calls for waiving outof-state tuition for non-resident students born in Mississippi but relocated by parents. Non-resident students who are veterans or students who claim residence in Mississippi no later than six months after separation from service may have out-of-state tuition waved, as well. Also among those with waived out of-state tuition include nonresidents who are evacuees of areas affected by Hurricane Katrina or Hurricane Rita. Out-of-state tuition waivers are at the discretion of each individual institution. The institutions may make their own decisions regarding further tuition wavers. However, these decisions must be determined to be fiscally responsible by the board. The bill will take effect after July 1. Laura Diven-Brown, director of Financial Aid for the University of
Mississippi, said the legislation will not have much effect on the university for the 2012-13 school year but may in the future. “The bill that was approved allows universities to have the flexibility to decide if they want to offer out-of-state scholarships,” Diven-Brown said. “It allows us to have that opportunity to decide if we’re going to offer scholarships to people from the neighboring states.” Diven-Brown also said if the university decides to make any changes based on the bill, the earliest affected date would be the fall of 2013. Diven-Brown said there are many aspects of the bill to be considered before decisions are made. “At this point in time, our university wants to ensure that we carefully consider all of the impacts of putting in some of these scholarships and how that would best help our students, our enrollment goals, looking at our campus and how we might be looking to grow our institution, and then taking a look at what that financial impact would be at our school,” Diven-Brown said. If the university decides to use the waiver opportunities, the money to do so would have to come from the university’s own funds. “Typically, things come from the general fund, meaning some
of it is state-appropriated money,” Diven-Brown said. “What this bill allowed is for us to make those decisions using our institutional budgets.” She said because no funds have yet been identified to offer such scholarships, it would be premature to say where the money might come from. Higher Education Commissioner Hank Bounds said he believes the bill will most notably help border-universities, like Delta State University in Cleveland and the Mississippi University for Women in Columbus, to meet their enrollment goals, according to the Associated Press. Representative Toby Barker, principal author of House Bill 1095, said the bill could be beneficial to all universities in the state. “The good thing about this bill is it gives all universities the ability to compete,” Barker said. “Obviously the universities in the border counties or near the border already have a sort of natural pool to draw from in the surrounding states. However, as so many of our universities have reputations that are known throughout this region of the country, I imagine that if they chose to, all universities could benefit.” Barker said there is no deadline for the waiver proposals to be submitted by the universities.