Tuition hike of 34% across 5 years coming to California State University
Stay up-to-date with free briefings on topics that matter to all Californians. Subscribe to CalMatters today for nonprofit news in your inbox.
Lea este artículo en español.
The California State University system voted today to raise tuition 6% annually for the next five years, a decision that seemed destined when its leaders revealed in May that Cal State brings in far less revenue than it needs to educate its nearly half a million students.
The system’s board of trustees voted 15 to 5 to approve the hikes, choosing financial stability over the collective outcry of students and the faculty union that denounced the move.
The Cal State “is a dream engine” but approving tuition hikes is a “nightmare scenario,” said Cal State trustee Jose Antonio Vargas, who ultimately voted for the increases.
The first increase will kick in for all tuition-paying students next fall. For in-state undergraduates, that’ll be an uptick of $342, rising to $6,084 per year. After five years, annual undergraduate tuition will be $1,940 higher than it was in the 2023-24 school year.
Currently, tuition and campus fees at most Cal States are below $8,000 — and below the national average of nearly $10,000.
Cal State is in a race to increase its graduation rates — especially among Black, Latino and Native American students — to make good on a promise that all major ethnic groups graduate at similar levels by 2025. That means more faculty, classes, tutors, mental health professionals and other academic expenses. Other expenses include more than $40 million annually to adopt changes to how the system tracks and resolves sexual discrimination cases after a series of high-profile incidents that led to top officials resigning. Two marquee reports published in July faulted Cal State’s handling of sexual misconduct violations. Also looming over the system is the risk of strikes as workers seek raises Cal State says it cannot afford.
Cal State expects to draw $148 million in new revenues in the first year of the tuition jump. Core to the plan is that one-third of those revenues will support student financial aid.
Around 60% of Cal State undergrads don’t pay any tuition because they receive enough state and system financial aid. An additional 18% of students pay partial tuition. Cal State senior staff say that won’t change under the tuition hike. Meanwhile, a new state grant is sending more money to middle-class students.
Those details were scant consolation to the students raging against the increases during yesterday’s meeting of the Cal State board of trustees. Across roughly 2.5 hours of designated time for public comments, an hour longer than trustees planned, students inveighed against the trustees for proposing the tuition hikes and reprimanded the trustees for slouching and looking at their phones during the students’ remarks. Some decried what they called the inherent racism of raising revenue through tuition hikes at a system that enrolls mostly students of color. A few admonished Cal State for not explaining how the hikes will affect students who pay full tuition. Others bitterly observed that the incoming system chancellor’s compensation will exceed $1 million.
“Students are supposed to be offered affordable higher education but instead we are slowly being stripped away of our education because the CSU fails to see us as students but instead sees us as their salary increases,” said Cassandra Garcia, the student body president at Sonoma State.
“You watch your students sleep in cars from the comfort of your gated communities,” another student from Cal State Dominguez Hills said.
“We are working numerous jobs just to be able to attend and you want to raise tuition,” said Courtland Briggs, a student from Cal State Channel Islands. “It’s pathetic. Y’all are pathetic.”
Shortly after the public comment session Tuesday, Interim Chancellor Jolene Koester tried to quell the nerves of trustees. “I know you are uncomfortable and I appreciate your discomfort,” she said. But Koester reiterated her comments in July that it’s never a good time to raise tuition and expecting students to ever support hikes is “fantasy.”
Among the trustees opposing the hikes were two prominent California lawmakers and likely gubernatorial hopefuls who sit on the board of trustees: Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis, who has announced she’s running for governor in 2026, and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond, who’s been “seriously considering” jumping into the race.
Kounalakis said the trustees “headed into an action that you do not fully understand the consequences of,” she said today before the vote. Even if 60% of undergraduates don’t pay tuition, 184,000 students do. “I don’t see how we can do this without knowing what a $2,000 a year increase is going to mean for our students. We know anecdotally that a lot of students are going to drop out.” She wanted to postpone the vote until trustees learned more — and let the incoming chancellor who starts next month make the final call.
UPDATED: Please read and follow our commenting policy: