With the start of a new school year comes a new price for the 2024-2025 cohort’s tuition. For first-year students, this is their first time paying a student tuition bill.
University of Oregon students pay their student bills through DuckWeb, the university’s management system. Under the Student Menu tab of the site, students can find a link to QuickPay where they can submit their payment. Students will receive an email when their student bills have been added to their accounts.
The cost of tuition for Oregon residents is $13,403 and the cost for non-residents is set at $41,865 for incoming students, not counting mandatory fees. With mandatory fees, tuition lands at $16,136 for residents and $44,598 for non-residents. This does not include the cost of housing or meals.
For students living on campus, housing fees will vary depending on where the student lives, according to University Housing.
UO tuition and fees are based on residency, student classification, credits enrolled, major and term. The course listing is the easiest way to check for specific course fees. Mandatory fees for online courses vary based on the class and status as an admitted or non-admitted student, according to UO’s Mandatory Enrollment and Course Fees.
On top of regular tuition and fees, there is a $25 per credit fee for asynchronous online courses. This fee helps provide extra services to support students taking these courses, according to UO’s Tuition and Fees webpage.
According to UO’s Funding Sources webpage, “Tuition is the primary source of funding for the university’s academic operations.” In the 2022-23 school year, UO received a net total of $319.9M in non-resident tuition and $141.5M in resident tuition.
The Tuition and Fee Advisory Board is the group at the university that reviews and suggests changes to tuition and fees for each year before they are sent to the university president. The president then reviews the changes before suggesting a tuition plan to the Board of Trustees. The final tuition rates are set by the Board of Trustees.
Everyone in the university community can get involved in the process by attending TFAB meetings, open forums or sharing their thoughts during public comment periods. General meeting dates and times are made available to the public through their website.
During the 2024-25 fiscal year, TFAB will meet this fall to cover topics like the basics of UO’s budget, how financial aid works and long-term financial planning for the university, according to the UO tuition site.
In the winter of 2025, they will meet again to discuss possible changes to fees including mandatory fees, housing rates, course fees, graduate tuition and tuition rates for the next group of undergrad students.
Brian Fox, associate vice president for budget, financial analysis and data analytics, is a member of TFAB.
“My office provides a lot of data and financial support to help that group understand the context. We help provide that information so that members of [TFAB] feel like they have everything that they need to make an educated decision or an educated recommendation,” Fox said.
In the summer of 2020, the University of Oregon introduced the Oregon Guarantee program, which locks undergraduate tuition and certain fees for students for up to five years.
This program applies to all students and covers tuition and administratively controlled mandatory fees, but not lab or course fees. The guarantee applies for 20 terms, from the summer of enrollment until spring five years later.
“Tuition and mandatory fees, or administratively controlled fees, are set for five years and then if a student goes for a sixth year they roll onto the cohort that came right before them, so they don’t see a giant increase,” Fox said.
If the Board of Trustees approves a tuition and fee increase of more than 5% for in-state undergraduate students, the increase must also be approved by the Higher Education Coordinating Commission or the state legislature before it can take effect.
“The TFAB process is all about tuition for the next cohort and our financial aid programs. Those are four-year programs. We don’t do scholarships for one year and then see how things go. We want to make sure that students and their families can really plan around a consistent tuition price,” Fox said.
Graduate student tuition at the University of Oregon is determined by the specific program in which the student is enrolled. In addition to tuition, all graduate students are required to pay a set of published mandatory fees. These fees are separate from the undergraduate Guaranteed Tuition Program.
Tuition for Law School students also varies by program.
According to UO’s Major Cost Drivers, tuition increases are mostly due to a decrease in public funding and labor costs account for 77% of expenditures.
The university’s tuition page states that while the cost of public education “has only increased slightly over the last two decades when adjusted for inflation, the level of public support has declined significantly during the same time. Fundamentally, public disinvestment has shifted the burden of paying for a college education to students and families.”