Higher Ed | Daily Report

Alan Light/WikipediaJerry Brown, 1978

In his education plan, Governor-elect Jerry Brown acknowledged the problem of rapidly increasing fees at California's four-year universities.

"When I was governor, the price students paid for a higher education was a fraction of what it is today," he noted.

So what can kind of fees might California State and University of California students expect to see now that Brown is back for round two?

Brown's plan for higher education doesn't make any specific promises about fees. Brown said back in April that "enough is enough," when it comes to steep hikes in college and university fees. "We've got to stop it and roll it back."

But at the Sept. 28 gubernatorial debate, Brown said he wouldn't roll back recent fee increases in his first year, but that he'd "do the best I can" not to raise fees in years to come:

As you know, I’d have one vote as the chairman, and in the past I used to have a few disagreements with the regents. Look, I’d love to roll back the fees, I’d love to have a freeze, but that would require either the university becoming a lot more efficient than it is or the state finding billions of dollars that it doesn’t yet have. One way or another, we are going to protect UC.

Perhaps surprisingly, UC fees more than doubled during Brown's tenure, from $600 per year in 1975 to $1,315 in 1983.

In fact, UC students saw a 32 percent fee increase in the 1982-83 school year – the same percentage increase that the UC Regents approved last November, leading students to protest. The 32 percent hike in Brown's era amounted to a $300 increase, while last year's bump cost students $2,514 per year.

The 119 percent increase in fees under Brown was bigger than the 81 percent increase UC students dealt with during Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's time in office – so far, that is. The regents will set fees for 2011-12 later this month.

A UC history of student fees notes that in 1981 and 1982, the UC took a big hit to its state-funded budget, and significant fee hikes allowed the university to fund programs that used to be paid for by state funds. Apparently, students protested those hikes, too.

Although the UC Regents set student fees, California's governor has two main levers to influence the amount, said Steve Boilard, higher education director for the Legislative Analyst's Office.

First is the amount of state funding the governor sets for the UC in his budget proposal, which assumes a certain fee level. That fee level becomes the starting point for the regents.

Secondly, past governors have developed compacts with the UC that specify expected fee levels or a maximum fee increase per year. Then again, Schwarzenegger's compact with the UC was supposed to keep fees to no more than 10 percent per year. That turned out to be a promise he couldn't keep.

Brown's plan for education proposes a new Master Plan for Higher Education. The original 1960 document committed to keeping California higher education tuition-free.

He also advocates increasing UC and CSU funding by transferring money from prisons to universities, a move that Schwarzenegger proposed earlier this year. Below, take a look at some of Brown's other higher education related promises. Also, check out Brown's positions on education policies and issues at Politics Verbatim.