UConn will enter fiscal year 2024 with budgets that significantly increase institutionally funded financial aid for students and develop a flexible road map to long-term financial sustainability by seeking new areas of revenue and cost savings.
The UConn Board of Trustees unanimously adopted the FY24 operating and capital budgets Wednesday for UConn Storrs and regional campuses along with UConn Health. The new fiscal year starts Saturday and runs through June 30, 2024.
The budgets come with many changes that make it difficult to compare against previous years, including the state’s decision to start funding the retirement costs for all UConn employees, as it already did for other state agencies.
The change, for which UConn has expressed deep gratitude, removes future risk of increased costs of those underfunded liabilities.
It’s expected that UConn’s faculty will be even more competitive when applying for research grants. That’s because more of the grant money would go to the funded projects and less to the researchers’ fringe benefit costs, which previously were higher than peers because UConn shouldered those expenses.
As in previous years, UConn also is substantially boosting the amount of financial aid it will allocate to students, with that total increasing from $258.7 million in FY23 to $283.1 million in the coming fiscal year.
Of that, the institutionally funded amount that comes as a portion of tuition revenue will increase from $164.9 million to $181.3 million. The rest comes from federal sources such as the Pell Grant, state programs, scholarships funded by specific departments, and scholarships from private sources such as donor endowments.
State law requires the University to set aside at least 15% of its tuition revenue for need-based aid, but UConn voluntarily exceeds that each year, with the FY24 amount representing 16.5%.
“We’ve been aggressive in using financial aid to bring costs down for students who come to us with financial need,” says Nathan Fuerst, UConn’s vice president for enrollment planning and management. “We work very hard to try to attract the best students and make the University of Connecticut the best and most affordable option for them.”
As the University continues to attract record admissions applications from near and far, one way in which UConn has increased revenue and avoid cuts that would impact the academic enterprise has been an increase in out-of-state and international students, who pay a higher tuition rate than Connecticut residents.
Although that is expected to continue in the coming fiscal year, qualified Connecticut residents are not displaced to make room for others. About 70% of the undergraduate student body comes from Connecticut, a ratio that is expected to continue into future years.
In fact, of the approximately 15,000 Connecticut high school students who applied last year for a spot in the Class of 2027, about half were offered admission to the Storrs campus. Of the rest, about 45% were offered admission to one of the campuses in Stamford, Hartford, Waterbury, or Avery Point.
“Although the demographic trends indicate that Connecticut is experiencing one of the nation’s most significant decreases in graduating high school seniors, we at the same time are seeing growth in talented students in the applicant pool,” Fuerst says. “We continue to attract them to the university, with our financial aid strategy being an important element in that success.”
Overall, the FY24 operating budgets comprise almost $1.6 billion for UConn Storrs and regional campuses, and $1.5 billion for UConn Health’s clinical, research, and academic operations.
UConn’s FY24 budgets for Storrs and the regional campuses will be in balance thanks to one-time funds from the state to help close what would have been a substantial gap, along with $16.1 million in one-time unrestricted UConn prior fund balance money.
“We continue to be grateful to the Governor, the Office of Policy and Management, and the General Assembly for continuous investment in UConn and for recognizing the value of the state’s flagship university,” President Radenka Maric said in a message to the UConn community when the state budget was unveiled this spring.
“It allows us to continue to provide an affordable and outstanding education to our students, contribute to the state’s economic growth, and provide the highest quality patient care,” she added.
UConn Health continues its noteworthy success in ramping up clinical revenue, having reversed the unavoidable decline it experienced when it had to curtail many non-urgent business operations during the COVID pandemic.
Like the UConn Storrs and regional campuses budget, the UConn Health budget is balanced including $22.1 million in one-time unrestricted UConn prior fund balance money.
UConn Health has more than doubled its net patient revenue over the last decade, from almost $372 million in FY14 to an estimated $895 million for the coming FY24 fiscal year.
Jeffrey Geoghegan, UConn’s chief financial officer and executive vice president for finance, said the increase was related to higher volume of patients at UConn Health John Dempsey Hospital, the center’s pharmacy operations, physician practices, and related services.
“We’ve seen a tremendous increase in patient activity on our Farmington campus and satellites this year, and expect that to continue,” he said.
