Martin: New Drake Tuition Guarantee will save students money, boost recruitment
A plan to guarantee four-year tuition rates to incoming Drake University undergraduate students beginning next fall should enable the university to boost its enrollment while also saving the average student nearly $6,000 over four years, Drake President Marty Martin said.
Drake announced this morning its new Drake Tuition Guarantee, which will set an annual tuition rate of $38,916 for students entering in fall 2017. That figure represents a one-time 11 percent increase from the current tuition rate, which is lower than the 18 percent increase this year’s seniors have seen over the past four years. Students who enter at the new rate will be guaranteed that tuition rate each year that they attend the university.
The new tuition plan is the result of a yearlong review that began in June 2015, just as Martin was coming on board as president.
“After analyzing the results of many conversations, surveys and focused research, we found that guaranteeing a tuition rate throughout the entirety of a student’s undergraduate experience would be the most effective way to simplify financial planning for Drake families,” Martin said.
Each year a new cohort of first-year students will be given an adjusted guaranteed annual rate that will apply to their college career at Drake. How much that rate will differ from the previous cohort’s rate “will depend upon the number of new students enrolled and where we are in meeting our needs, and that’s how we’ve always set tuition,” Martin said.
More total revenue through increased enrollment and retention should enable Drake to keep increases for each successive cohort of students reasonably low, he said.
Although the university will receive less per-student tuition revenue under the new model, it expects to make that up by enrolling more students and improved retention of students. “I think we’re going to have better numbers,” Martin said. “I’m confident of it.”
In each of the past two years, Drake’s enrollment goal has been targeted at an increase of 870 students, a goal it has missed both years. “The initial goal is to reach our target of 870, and with this strategy I’m confident we’ll be able to achieve that,” he said.
The new model does not apply to graduate students, including law and pharmacy students, who will continue on the traditional “across-the-board” tuition plan, Martin said. Additionally, current Drake undergraduate students will remain on the traditional tuition model that they entered with. Those students will have a 3 percent increase next year.
With the new model, Drake will be setting the guaranteed rate for each cohort much earlier — in April, rather than waiting until the following January. “You’re going to recruit the next class in August, and they need to know what that price is; you no longer refer back to last year’s price,” Martin said.
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