The Board of Trustees passed the proposed changes for tuition and fees at its meeting Friday.

The proposal came from the Student and Campus Affairs Committee, which passed the tuition and fees proposal Thursday.

Beginning in 2007, all students will pay $230 in addition to the current price of tuition. Included in this increase are provisions earmarked for increasing faculty salary and financial aid.

However, there is a certain percentage of this increase that is not earmarked for any specific allocation. It is lumped into a fund that will “improve quality and access” on campus, as Chancellor James L. Oblinger stated in the committee meeting Thursday.

Student Body President Will Quick was the only member of the Board to vote against the tuition proposal.

Quick said he was uncomfortable with this unmarked amount. He said he wanted more clarity as far as how this money, which totalled 20.9 percent of the increase, would be spent. According to Quick, he is opposed to increase in tuition anyway. He said he feels tuition increase should be covered by the state, and said if at all possible, he would have fought against any increase whatsoever. However, Quick said he knew that wasn’t an option.

“Because of the 6.5 percent cap I know that any increase below 6.5 percent is basically rubber stamped to go through,” Quick said.

So instead, Quick said he picked his battle. He said his biggest problem with the 20.9 percent that was not allotted was that it was “so ambiguous.”

He said on average, over the past three years, only 0.33 percent of the entire increase has gone to the Libraries, with only 1.67 percent going to technology and improvements. Anywhere from 5 to 8 percent has gone to advising, and 16 percent has gone to Student Services.

According to Quick, this is a problem because Student Services and advising do not affect all students. He said Student Services funds programs such as honors programs and student athlete programs. While Quick said he agrees those are very important, he said they only affect a small subsector of the University.

“It’s more responsible to fund areas that everybody can use,” Quick said.

Libraries is one of Quick’s biggest concerns, as far as tuition increase allotment. According to Quick, the Hunt Library the University is building on Centennial Campus is the number one legislative priority for NCSU for the 2007 sessions.

“I don’t see how we can ask for more money for a new library when we’re not putting enough funding in the library we have,” he said.

He said there were other trustees fairly supportive of his idea to request clearer allotments for the unmarked portion of the tuition, but he said they felt they needed to support the Chancellor’s proposals.

Quick was also the only trustee to vote against the fee increase.

According to Quick, he voted no because of the $41 athletic indebtedness fee. He said, though, that he felt the overall fee request was a very responsible number.

He pointed out that the fee total was actually under the allotted 6.5 percent at $59.50. The full amount the University could have passed was $65.40.

However, fees not under the cap include transit and indebtedness, and while Quick said he was in full support of both the transit and Stewart Theatre indebtedness fees, he felt the Athletic indebtedness fee was too high.

He said because Athletics already asked for a fee increase in operations, he couldn’t support a second increase for Athletics.

He said he feels Athletics has been irresponsible over the past few years by building so quickly, but not having an incremental increase in the Athletic indebtedness fee.

“When they come they’ve had to ask for big increases at one time,” Quick said.

According to Quick, this puts the burden on current students, asking a smaller group of students to pay more, rather than spreading the cost out.

He said one of the worst parts about the increase is that it is not under the cap, therefore it is not held harmless with respect to financial aid.

That means financially needy students also have to pay the increase, which Quick said is unfair because many of those students are working hard just to pay for school, and may not ever be able to enjoy the benefits of those fees.

“You’re asking the whole student body to pay for something that benefits a very small subsect,” Quick said.

Quick said this is the largest fee increase the Board of Trustees has approved for any one unit in his four years at the Unversity.

“I hate that it’s Athletics and not an academic unit,” he said.