At the first Undergraduate Student Government meeting of the semester, university administrators announced the student health fee is expected to increase.

Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Lori Stettler and Director of Administration and Finance Judy Marshall confirmed this from their advisor report in the meeting.

Stettler said the cost of the fee is based on healthcare price increase and how many insurance claims the university makes.

The result will not be known until the end of January when the university receives their claim analysis from the university’s insurance provider, Stettler said.

“This past year we’ve had several students have really bad accidents,” Stettler said.

Stettler said the amount of students in the past year explains the anticipated increase, which will be decided upon by the board of trustees in a meeting in February.

Marshall also announced the proposal of uncapping all student fees at 12 credit hours.

Even though students may take up to 18 or even more credit hours per semester, they will still be charged the same student fee for those taking 12 credit hours.

Stettler said this proposal is to create uniformity between the cost to attend the university and keep up with the increasing cost of living and services.

Some fees have not been increased for two to three years, she added.

“At some point, something has to give,” Stettler said. “We have to have a little bit of relief or we’re going to have to pay our services down.”

The university’s fees currently ranked second among Illinois state universities, below University of Illinois Chicago, Marshall said.

As a research university the tuition is lowest in the state, Marshall said.

Senator Lincoln Kinley said he liked the idea of uncapping fees, so students don’t take more credit hours than they can handle to save money.

“If you cap it, it would be more fair so people don’t have to say ‘Wow I’ll save so much money by taking 19 credit hours,’” Kinley said.

13 out of 23 senators attended the USG meeting, preventing the council from completing any business other than address reports.

Undergraduate Student Vice President Emily Buice asked senators to think about why they are apart of USG and why attendance to senate meetings is important.

“I’m here to help change the university,” Buice said. “I’m here to put my voice out there; Your voice out there so we can help make this university a better place.”

According to the USG agenda, the council was looking to vote on swearing in a senator and approve two RSO’s.

Staff writer Amelia Blakely can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter @AmeilaBlakely.

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