Naila Hussain’s introduction to America was on this campus.
She moved to this state from Bangladesh at the age of 16 and got a job right away as a cashier at Stamp Student Union. Since then, she has worked her way up to the position of assistant accounting clerk for Dining Services.
But with her husband out of work for the past 10 years because of diabetes and a single salary of $33,691.14, Hussain said, she would not be able to send her son to college.
The cost of tuition for an in-state student at this university is $9,427 for the 2014-15 year — almost a third of her salary. But with tuition remission, her son, now a junior, attends this university without any tuition costs.
“For me, I am not able to do it myself,” Hussain said. “It helped me lot because I don’t have to worry that much, you know, like his tuition, and it helps me so he can go to college.”
Tuition remission is a benefit that allows a current or retired full-time university employee, or an employee’s child or spouse, to take undergraduate or graduate classes free of tuition. Part-time employees and their spouses and children are eligible for reduced tuition rates.
There are 4,744 employees and 728 dependents using tuition remission this semester, according to data supplied by David Rieger, the assistant director for benefits in human resources.
This totals about $5.3 million per semester that this university does not receive, according to the data from Rieger.
Although this campus’s chapter of economic justice advocacy group Student Labor Action Project delivered an open letter to university President Wallace Loh’s office on Oct. 1 criticizing the university’s pay for employees, tuition remission — along with health care, paid vacation and leave — is a benefit the administration pays for on top of salaries.
The tuition remission program has expanded over the years, from offering tuition at a discounted price to the current 100-percent coverage at the university the employee works for, said Director of University Human Resources Dale Anderson, whose son went to this university.
With a turnover rate of just more than 7 percent and about 100 to 180 applicants for each low-wage position on campus, Anderson said, tuition remission, along with other employee benefits, makes working at this university an attractive option for future employees.
“As the parents of two kids, one who came here and one who didn’t, the prospect even years ago of perhaps my child or my children will come here [for free] is a factor you consider when you’re making an employment choice,” said Carlo Colella, the administration and finance vice president.
Alexander Jonas, a faculty research assistant for the Division of Information Technology, said he remembers having conversations with his wife about the uncertainty of paying for their son Ben’s college education without taking out loans.
After Ben was accepted to this university, Jonas said, it was a relief to know his education would be paid for. Without tuition remission, he said, he might have been forced to find a different way to pay for college or reconsider continuing his work as an employee at a public university.
“It’s a lifting of a part of the burden, the financial burden of providing a college education for your child,” Jonas said. “I had student loans after school and it was ten years to pay them off. To be able to say that, at least for the undergrad years, Ben won’t face that is a gift that we feel happy that we can give our child.”
Ben, a senior computer science major, said having his education paid for takes a lot of pressure off of him and allowed him to switch majors more easily by taking summer classes at a discounted cost.
“I’ve always realized the gravity of [tuition remission],” Ben said. “I knew about it from the get go. It played a pretty huge part [in choosing this university].”
Kimberly Williams, an accountant for University Payroll Services, used employee tuition remission to get her master’s degree at University of Maryland University College and is now using the benefit to pursue an MBA.
She had a baby girl, Kenzie, in May and said it’s nice knowing that if she still works at this university in 18 years, her daughter’s education is potentially paid for.
“[Tuition remission] is a great opportunity for employees to further their education because some people may not have thought about going to college but you can do it,” Williams said. “It helps open the doors for possibilities for others may not have even known were there because college is expensive.”
