The U of AZ Regents are letting us down

I have a friend who got a full athletic scholarship and went to the U of AZ 20 yrs ago. In 1988 the U sent him a statement of tuition costs showing how valuable his scholarship was. He said tuition was $900 a year then. Now it's approaching 7 times that.

In other words, tuition is increasing at an average rate of about 35% per year for those 20 yrs, with most of the increase during the past 10 years and, specifically, during Napolitano's "education governor" administration. Even during the housing boom, prices weren't appreciating that fast for homes.

While the university can complain about the legislature's appropriations, the fact remains that new buildings have gone up everywhere over the past few years. I think the big problem is that we have an entire generation of administrators at all levels of gov't and academia who have never had to do crisis management, adhere to strict budgets, or determine and set priorities due to the generally robust economy of the past 20-25 years.

BTW, the scholarship program worked well in my friend's case, as he became a well-paid professional, and has returned a lot of income to the state through income and other taxes through his earnings.