The University of Minnesota Board of Regents voted Wednesday to approve the upcoming year’s operating budget, hiking tuition across all campuses and making cuts to academic programs.
The $5.1 billion budget outlines a 6.5% increase in tuition for in-state undergraduate and graduate students attending the Twin Cities and Rochester campuses. Nonresident tuition rates will increase by 7.5%, raising out-of-state tuition costs to nearly $40,000 a year.
Colleges across the University will additionally face a 7% cut to academic programs, student services, research and other general operating costs.
Undergraduate resident and nonresident rates will increase by 4% on the Crookston and Duluth campuses, and by 5% on the Morris campus. Graduate rates will increase by 6.5% and 7.5% for residents and nonresidents, respectively.
The budget, which has received growing criticism from faculty and students in recent weeks, passed in a 9-3 vote with Regents James Farnsworth, Robyn Gulley and Bo Thao-Urabe voting against it.
“If this tuition increase was really about fairness for workers, we would also be addressing significant pay issues for contingent faculty,” Gulley said.
Thao-Urabe said she is concerned the tuition increase will impact the students who they feel need the most help.
President Rebecca Cunningham said the unprecedented challenges faced by higher education resulted in a challenging budget year for the University, which she said has experienced over $40 million in cuts from the federal government this year.
Cunningham said while she acknowledges the budget cuts are confusing and painful, the University is one of many across the country facing these kinds of changes.
“It is easy to be in these seats in years where there is excess money, this is not one of them,” Cunningham said. “As a board, you’re being asked to approve a balanced budget during a year where the University received no increase in state funding from the state of Minnesota for the first time in decades.”
The budget includes a $60 million one-time allotment and $15 million in recurring expenses for strategic investments towards the University’s systemwide strategic plan. Cunningham said in Wednesday’s Regents meeting that some of these investments could include AI innovation, improving the Saint Paul campus and investing in student well-being.
The budget includes workforce reinvestments as part of the $15 million recurring funds, with a proposed 3% raise for eligible employees and a 1% adjustment pool, which will be decided by individual departments.
Faculty and students have criticized the money being allocated toward strategic investments, many deeming it administrative “bloat,” which Cunningham pushed back against at the meeting.
“It’s very easy to blame administrators than to look hard at our state and country and understand there is less money available to us to invest compared to years ago,” Cunningham said.
Regent Tadd Johnson said he is pleased that, despite it being a difficult budget, the board has a fiscal responsibility to keep the doors open and keep the university’s reputation intact.
Johnson added he is pleased that tuition increases will not be as severe at the Duluth, Crookston and Morris campuses.
Regent Mary Turner said, amidst unprecedented challenges, there is a need to balance current student needs with future investments.
Regent Janie Mayeron said passing this budget is important to address ongoing challenges, but also to uphold the University’s mission.
“It’s financially responsible that we are anticipating that we may need to call on dollars that we didn’t think we would ever have to call on before,” Mayeron said. “While it is, as I said, the most difficult budget I have ever had to confront, I believe that I don’t see a different way to do it.”
Tenured Professor
Jun 29, 2025 at 12:20 pm
@Workforce
Regent Gulley is advocating for the workers at the U whose conditions are the most in need of amelioration. As a tenured professor, I care a lot less about “salary compression” for tenured faculty than I do about my non-tenure-track colleagues who are just as qualified and skilled as I am but who do the same work I do for poverty wages. And a budget that brings severe cuts to academic programming hurts all faculty, regardless of rank, which is another working condition issue Regent Gulley recognizes. A budget whose internal reallocations mean firing non-tenure-track faculty experts while downscaling the U’s excellent comprehensive academic coverage is not “pro-worker” in any way. Sounds like you should form a union if Regent Gulley and her “pro-union” “blindness” is antagonizing you this much.
human
Jun 29, 2025 at 11:33 am
Given that Turner and Gulley are pro union on a board of deeply anti-union regents, it’s hardly fair to badmouth Gulley alone. She and Turner are easily a million miles ahead of the rest of the board on the issue of working conditions. The entire board of regents needs to be held accountable to their benign neglect of the workforce at the U.
Workforce
Jun 27, 2025 at 6:36 am
Regent Gulley is not pro-worker. She’s pro-union. Those are not the same thing. (In my experience, University employees who are pro-union are also very pro-Gulley.) Any regent who was really pro-worker would be advocating on behalf of ALL workers, not just adjuncts, students, and those already represented by labor unions. Her focus on “workers,” so narrowly defined, is a real blindspot for her (and her supporters) and a real problem for the institution. I wonder if she even knows what salary compression is.
KG
Jun 26, 2025 at 5:26 am
A worker — The U American Indian Studies budget is being reduced by 7%? Great news! AIS issued the disgusting December 2023 AIS Gaza statement, accusing Israel of genocide, when it was Israel that was attacked by genocidal Hamas terrorists. All AIS faculty, even non-tenured faculty, signed that embarrassing document. Other UMN faculty explicitly called the AIS statement antisemitic. But AIS was arrogant and adamant. They refused to rescind the statement and left it on the U website for months until the U itself finally removed it.
Furthermore, AIS teaches in the classroom that the settler-colonialist paradigm is applicable to Israel-Palestine, which is false and untenable if examined seriously with history, archaeology, and DNA. This calumny was repeated in their Gaza statement. Zionist Jews came to live with their brethren in Israel. They legally purchased land in Israel from its owners and lived on it. There was no “colonizing” or “conquest” by foreign Jews in Israel.
Let’s be clear. Many indigenous communities have expressed support for Israel in its fight against Hamas terrorism and extremist Palestinians. For example, an Indigenous Embassy was inaugurated in Jerusalem, attended by Māori, Pacific Islanders (Tonga), Native American, Khoi, Arawak-Taino, Cherokee, and others.
Let’s take Nick Estes as a specific example. Estes pretentiously assumed the position of Theme Editor for a Journal of Architectural Education special issue, citing his affiliation with the U. This issue, planned to be released in Fall 2025 (since canceled because of its crude antisemitism) portrayed Israel in the most gruesome light while portraying Hamas terrorists, rapists, and murderers in a positive way. What are Nick Estes’ credentials for Theme Editor? Is he an “expert” on architecture? On Palestine-Israel? What exactly is his research and publications in these fields and in what forums? Nick Estes sullied the U’s reputation, given the potential for readers to misconstrue his expertise, and deserves to be fired.
Too bad the AIS budget wasn’t reduced by 100%. The money could be better spent.
a worker
Jun 24, 2025 at 6:29 pm
Agree with CLA Prof; Gulley sees this for what it is – not actually doing anything to invest in the workforce, instead cutting where cuts have already been made. For example, AIS – the UMN has the first AIS Dept in the country but it’s so small and underfunded, a 7% cut to their operating budget might actually shut down that Department. Rumors of an increase to health insurance in the coming year mean that even a 3% bump will be erased or nearly erased. Gulley also acknowledged that a 3% merit increase when tuition is being increased by more than twice that looks ridiculous. I agree with you, WorkForce, employees deserve much better from our regents. May they all be more like Gulley.
CLA Prof
Jun 23, 2025 at 6:27 pm
@Workforce
The 4% raise pool is split between merit and market-based adjustments, meaning many employees will see something less than a salary increase of 4%. I got my new salary letter recently, and my raise was basically the same as it was each year for the past few years. Merit raises of 2-3% are by no means atypical. While welcome, this budget’s merit increases are not some historic or unprecedented investment in sub-inflationary wage increases. At the same time, Cunningham’s budget forces colleges to cut 7% of their operating budgets. In many colleges, especially CLA, this will mean not renewing associate faculty, as the budget used to pay associate faculty is the only really flexible pool of money CLA can cut. So yes, lecturer faculty who don’t get fired from those budget cuts and manage to still be here next year will see a small, not-keeping-with-inflation salary raise.
Regent Gulley seems to have seen this much more clearly than you did.
Workforce
Jun 20, 2025 at 12:46 pm
Regent Gulley’s “no” vote on the budget is a slap in the face of all employees represented through shared governance at the University of Minnesota. The budget includes a 4% raise pool and a recurring $15 million to address workforce needs. These budget items are in direct response to critical issues and concerns raised by the University Senate on behalf of all University workers in its unanimously approved Workforce Reinvestment Resolution. The U’s workers deserve better from their regents.
Jay-Bee
Jun 20, 2025 at 10:05 am
It’s crazy that another fee increase is happening. 6% is huge.
I have to say this story is missing info. All the programs should be named in the story. More lazy writing by journalist.
so much side eye
Jun 19, 2025 at 2:07 pm
Cunningham’s attempts to gaslight us by saying administrative bloat somehow includes P&A staff were particularly egregious. Everyone knows administrative bloat is real and it refers directly and only to upper administrative workers, not librarians or administrative staff supporting research. It’s okay, Cunningham, we all know you feel some modicum of guilt for the salaries you and your closest staff are paid, otherwise you would not be so sensitive to the term (or to recent excellent OpEd pieces). You are not the first or last university president to feel that guilt. You’ll never gain trust trying to pretend it’s everyone else who gets the terms of reference wrong. Just be real. This is Minnesota – we might not tell you to your face that we can see right through you but, well, we can see right through you.