Coupled with these events, state government has adhered to a funding model based on higher tuition, higher amounts of financial aid, and lower support from taxpayers. Over the past years, the rates of tuition increases have been more than the rate of inflation. And taxpayer support of the UW System, which had typically been more than 12 percent of state tax-dollar appropriations, has now declined to less than 9 percent. It is unlikely a new funding model for the UW System will emerge in the near future. The pace of tuition increases seen over the past decade cannot continue.
Federal dollars are limited, as are options for generating additional revenue from taxpayers.
Recognizing these budgetary constraints, the UW System is advancing two initiatives to generate additional revenue and to provide increased levels of flexibility at System institutions. The first initiative, the Bullseye Revenue Policy, was originally drafted in 1996. This is a tuition management policy that moves the UW System from a policy based solely on the use of enrollment targets to one based on both enrollments and tuition revenue targets. Under this plan, each UW System institution will have an annualized tuition revenue target. If the target is surpassed, institutions will retain 75 percent of the excess tuition.