A Conversation with President Caldwell About the 2024-2024 Tuition Freeze

I love school. I love learning new things, I love going to events on campus, I love working towards a brighter future for myself and my community. But I hate the cost. 

Like most students, I dread the biannual tuition bills, and I know I’m not the only one who grimaces when those reminder emails are sent out. There’s a brutal few moments of thrumming anxiety while you wait for the “amount due” screen to load, crossing your fingers that the total isn’t thousands of dollars higher than the prior semester. 

This year was different. 

Centenary University has announced a tuition freeze for the 2024-2025 academic year, applicable to both undergraduate and graduate programs. 

This decision is aimed at easing the financial burden on students and their families, acknowledging the economic challenges many are facing in the wake of the pandemic and mounting rates of inflation. In tandem with this tuition freeze, housing costs for on-campus residence halls will also remain fixed. 

The University's move is part of a broader effort to make higher education more accessible during times of financial strain.

I sat down with President Caldwell to learn more about this exciting initiative. 

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 What factors inspired the freeze?

Well, as a new University president, what I’m looking to do is consider higher education differently. So often, people are focused on improving the logistics of that education instead of student needs. We’re trying to transform the culture from teaching students to helping students learn. These may sound like the same thing, but they’re very different. 

If you’re teaching students, you’re making students respond to you, which is what most higher education institutions have done. If you are centered on student learning, you adjust to the needs of the students. 

With this policy, we are sensitive to the FAFSA debacle that happened, delaying and cutting into student finances. Seeing this chaotic process students were going through, we decided to freeze the tuition to make sure they know we care. We hear them, we feel their frustration. 

How does this align with the University’s long-term financial goals? 

By freezing tuition, we actually end up generating more revenue than if we had raised tuition by 2 percent, which is the standard yearly increase for universities. 

One of the things I am trying to do is raise as much money as possible so that no student leaves Centenary for financial reasons. Right now, we don’t have enough of an endowment, and we’re raising funds to change that. I made that a priority. 

In fact, one of the things we started doing is a Student Financial Book. We give students the opportunity to opt-in if they and their family are struggling to cover the cost of tuition. We share this data with the Board of Directors, many of whom are eager to support individual students. This is an integral part of our philosophy of being student focused. 

So this new program really speaks to educational access and student retention. How do you plan to track these numbers and keep a profile on the impact this freeze is having?

This is also done through the Student Financial Book! As the contributions come in, we are able to see how many students have been helped, and it gives us a better sense of what students need and how we can continue to show up for them. 

Will this freeze have any effect on faculty salaries and their resource funds?

One of the realities is that Centenary has not been in a strong financial position for many years. Long before I got here, long before the last few presidents. Partly because they had been more focused on generating revenue and saving costs internally. 

Since my background has been so broad- I’ve worked in education, government, and business- I’ve build a large network of support. We’re actually looking for external programs to generate revenue so we can not only maintain faculty but increase their salaries, our investments in facilities, and other programs long-term. 

Tell me more about these programs. 

When you talk about student focus, you’re investing in the adult learning life cycle. 

Because of the pandemic, many of our current students had a horrible high school education experience. They don’t like education because of that. 

To combat this, we’ve partnered with the Ideal Institute of Technology in Pleasantville, NJ. For eight years, they have provided successful applied science and vocational programs. We’re paving the way for these students to come to Centenary for their degree through our new combined program, Applied Science U. We have established a learning site in Pleasantville to accomplish this. 

The heart of it is maintaining Centenary’s commitment to student learning needs. 

By doing this, we differentiate ourselves from other universities, and so our enrollment will grow, helping to strengthen us financially. 

In other terms of financial health, for the University and its students, are there any plans to cut, maintain, or add to other costs to accommodate for the freeze?

Because we have external sources of revenue, the freeze is not going to affect the University’s operations negatively. For example, since my term as President began, I have prioritized making strategic investments. 

There has been a history here of managing by expenses. Great idea, but we don’t have the money for it. And that stifles innovation! 

I want to get the dreams of our faculty, staff, and students on the table. So, the idea is to provide a glass half-full mentality. I see opportunity here, and our Cyclones do too. 

The other thing is, in the past we have relied almost exclusively on fundraising and enrollment for our revenue. Now, we are extending to other avenues, like certification programs. We have a growing program to provide English as a Second Language (ESL) training and Career Technical Education (CTE) training to school districts. This allows current teachers to better serve their students as well as boost their own resumes and salaries. 

By doing outreach like this, we generate hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue that we would not have otherwise. We’re looking to grow the University and our community through this.

Looking forward, how sustainable is the freeze?

We’re taking each year in time. By freezing tuition, we’ve already seen higher enrollment, which has increased revenue. 

Financially, we will become more sustainable, so we will be making our decisions about rates of tuition and housing in line with this. 

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Centenary’s dedication to student experience and financial health continues to shape the University into a better, more equitable place to learn and thrive. 

As enrollment rises and emerging new programs flourish, President Caldwell’s innovative approach ensures a new era of more accessible and impactful higher education.