GOP Proposal Would Cap Tuition Increases at UW System
Board of Regents recently approved a 5% increase.
Phil Roeder (CC-BY)
Earlier this month, the Universities of Wisconsin system Board of Regents approved a 5% tuition increase for undergraduate students for the 2025-26 academic year.
Legislative Republicans are now trying for a third time to cap tuition increases at the state’s public university system at no higher than the rate of inflation.
The proposal would limit the Board of Regents to “only increase tuition and fees for resident undergraduate students up to the rate of the Consumer Price Index.”
“A statutory cap on future tuition increases will provide Wisconsin families and UW System institutions with the predictability required to budget for college expenses into the future,” according to the proposal coauthored by Sen. André Jacque, R-De Pere, and Rep. David Murphy, R-Greenville.
Jacque and Murphy did not respond to requests for further comment.
Tuition will increase by 4% at all universities in the fall, with individual schools able to add an optional 1% additional increase for a maximum of 5%. The increase will raise tuition by about $382, according to the UW system. This is the third year in a row the UW system raised its prices after a 10-year tuition freeze.
Mark Pitsch, spokesperson for the Universities of Wisconsin, said the system is among the most affordable in the United States.
“It is critical that we have the flexibility to maintain the quality that students deserve and parents expect,” Pitsch said Thursday.
Under the 2025-27 state budget, the university system will receive a funding increase of about $256 million. State funding represents about 20% of total revenues in the UW system. Tuition and fees makes up about 60% of the system’s revenue.
Resident undergraduate tuition increased 7.7% during the 10-year period from 2015 to 2025 — well below UW comprehensive peers in neighboring states, where increases ranged from 21.7% to 28.8% during the same period, according to the UW system.
This is not the first time Murphy and Jacque have floated a tuition cap plan.
Murphy introduced legislation capping tuition at the Consumer Price Index in 2019, and the two legislators introduced similar legislation in 2023.
“Now more than ever, the Legislature must implement a common-sense law placing controls on these types of skyrocketing tuition increases,” the proposal states. “That’s why we are again introducing legislation to cap tuition and fee increases for in-state Wisconsin undergraduates at levels no higher than the rate of inflation.”
Wisconsin Republicans are trying again to cap tuition increases at UW campuses was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
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