A larger incoming class and changes in state funding could result in a budget surplus nearly double what Ohio University of ficials originally expected for this school year.
OU officials projected a budget surplus of $16.4 million, but now an extra $12 million might also be on the table.
Raising tuition for the 2013-14 school year added about $2.2 mil lion to OU’s surplus, but more stu dents enrolled and OU will receive an extra $4.5 million, according to a memo from OU’s Vice President for Finance and Administration Stephen Golding to OU’s Board of Trustees in a board agenda.
OU’s Board of Trustees in creased tuition for this school year by 1.6 percent last April.
Golding and OU Budget Direc tor Chad Mitchell were not imme diately available by press time.
“These positive budget varianc es are essential to providing the onetime capital necessary to sup port our $100 million Investment Program and to grow the univer sity’s balance sheet and provide the financial capacity essential to supporting our Twenty-Year Capi tal Improvement Program,” Gold ing wrote in the memo.
Trustees will discuss this sur plus at their Aug. 29 meeting.
In the memo, Golding also re ferred to OU’s spending model as “conservative” and cited OU’s $34 million during the 2013 fiscal year and carryover to this school year as evidence. OU spent 98 percent of State Share of Instruction (SSI) and undergraduate tuition and “better than expected revenue and expenditure performance” across campuses last year, according to the memo.
