Though Eastern Kentucky University’s enrollment ticked up this fall, tuition revenues are still expected below projections, shy about $2 million.
That was the message from President David McFaddin Wednesday at the EKU Board of Regents meeting at the Powell Building.
“The mix of students is a little less graduate than we anticipated, a few more part time than full time, and so those things happen kind of year in and year out – not substantial, but impactful,” McFaddin told WEKU.
EKU’s overall proposed budget this academic year is more than $430 million. In total, the university's budget is short about $6 million, McFaddin confirmed later in the week, a figure that includes the $2 million in short tuition revenues and $4 million due to health care costs.
Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer Dan Hendrickson said overall enrollment jumped 0.07%, with the population shifting to fewer returning students and first-time freshmen, but more first-time transfers, online enrollment and dual-credit students.
He also said changes to financial aid have affected enrollment, along with the demographic cliff, caused by a lower birthrate after the 2008 recession. Hendrickson said retention is holding roughly flat at 76%.
Despite tuition revenues coming in under projection, McFaddin said he does not think it will severely hinder the budget, and the university has had to find similar opportunities to be efficient in the past.
“I think when we settle everything up this year, we'll be up in enrollment,” McFaddin said. “The mix of students will generate a revenue experience that is different than what we projected from a budgetary standpoint.”
EKU’s state performance funding is up for fiscal 2027 by 9%, coming in at $5 million.
“We had the most performance funding growth by any institution,” McFaddin noted. “Now I will tell you, it's not enough, and it does not recognize the work that we're doing. But for what is possible in the model that we live in, we are performing the best and making the most of it.”
The General Assembly considered cutting some funding to state universities during this year’s budget session, but ultimately kept levels close to where they had been.
Last year’s budget had a similar tuition deficit, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Jackie Dudley said. The gap didn’t affect the overall budget, she said, instead balancing out with other actual revenues.
Scholarships are one point of the budget with considerable variance, officials noted.
“Scholarships are really hard to forecast,” Dudley said. “We award them early, but you don't always know who's coming, and are they the students with the full packages or those that maybe don't have? And it's a hard thing to try to budget for.”
Tuition levels for the 2026-27 school year have been set and are up 2% over last year in addition to rising meal and other costs.
