I love the University of Houston. I love UH so much that upon completing my bachelor’s degree I came back for a master’s degree and a doctorate. And on Tuesday I will be voting against the student referendum for a new football stadium and the Hofheinz Pavilion renovation.
UH students face an unstable financial environment. In 2009, 42 percent of new students took out loans to pay for their tuition while 82 percent received some form of financial aid.
UH is made up primarily of students who attempt to work their own way through school or who receive assistance of some sort to make their way through.
Moreover, the job market upon graduation is bleak. UH wants 39,820 students who are facing financial uncertainty and who are already having a difficult time paying for school to give them at least an additional $90,000,000.
Students will subsidize the athletics department to a tune of $4,407,707 this year. Every semester you are charged a student service fee. This semester the fee was $190. About 27 percent of that fee is allocated for intercollegiate athletics.
If the referendum passes, over the next 25 years, students would pay at least an additional $90 million on top of the $4.4 million that we already pay. Students would be spending over $210 million to subsidize the athletics department.
Alumni who attend the games are financially stable enough to spend money on UH. The cash-strapped students should not be asked to shoulder the burden.
— Samuel Brower, Ph.D. student, education
So how come I don't see any articles on here that are for the fee? Equal distribution would be nice…
Plus, students get free tickets, so basically $45 season tickets to get into EVERY sport is beyond a great deal.
You don't read them because you haven't submitted any. And you get in because students pay over $4.4 million to the athletics department through the student service fee. No student gets in for free.
Well I guess you should have lobbied a bit more, but the stadium and renovations are official now…
Its $45 dollars a semester. You pay more for one physics book. Stop being drama queens.
I am a member of UHAA, and I now have a son who is a freshman at UH. As a student, I helped pay for the Rec center, even though I never got to use it due to my schedule (I attended full-time while working one, two or three jobs and raising four children as a single mom). Did I complain about funding the Rec center? No! I'm proud my university has such a fantastic facility, and little did I know at the time I would have a son who loves spending all his extra time there! Same goes for a new football stadium — ours is sorely out of date, and paying for it by increasing student fees is no different than improving parking lots, academic buildings, etc. We are a major university with an aging campus and upgrades are a necessary part of business! This year, it's a new stadium, next time around, it may be a new health center. Just because you don't support athletics doesn't mean the athletic program isn't an integral part of the school. I'm proud to see the forward strides our university is making on ALL FRONTS!!! So, I help fund progress as an alum, and my son's student fees help also. And NOBODY IS WHINING AT OUR HOUSE!!
maybe tilman fertitta can spend some of his millions on the school since him and the other regents, who are heavily into developing/construction, think it's so important that we make this school really big. tilman can sell his 8 million dollar yacht and a few properties and save students millions in loan interest and probably stop a suicide or two.
meanwhile digital technology is allowing schools to develop free online courses and cheap accreditation and people are struggling to survive – but yeah it's really vital the rich powerful people in charge keep squeezing money from students to build these outdated institutions that barely educate (except for lessons in obedience and mindlessness) many students.
and it's most vital that we build a fresh new stadium to have some of the worst students throw around a ball. everyone knows that appearances are everything, so we must have the newest buildings and stadiums and the rest can be swept under the rug.