Student leaders and university administrators are asking for public feedback regarding a potential engineering undergraduate tuition surcharge.

Mark Kushner, dean of the College of Engineering, will talk about the tuition surcharge during an open forum Thursday evening at 207 Marston Hall.

He said students would immediately experience the benefits of the surcharge if it is approved by the Board of Regents.

“There will be immediate benefits. We will start the [faculty] hiring process, we will start hiring teaching assistants, there will be laboratory renovation. I am quite certain there will be an immediate benefit,” Kushner said.

GSB Senator Katie Gidlewski, senior in chemical engineering, said the forum is open to all students, as other differential tuition proposals could follow in the future.

“It is open to students from across the university, because if the tuition proposal goes through the Board of Regents, it could set a precedent for other colleges,” she said. “You don’t have to be in engineering to come. It will impact people across the university.”

If the surcharge is approved by the Regents at their December meeting, engineering juniors and seniors would be charged an additional $500 per year beginning in the fall of 2006 and would increase to $1,750 by the 2009-10 school year, Kushner said.

Gidlewski said engineering students concerned about the cost of their education should attend.

“Juniors and seniors would be paying more than anyone else for tuition at the college or university,” she said.

The surcharge costs should be the greatest concern to students, Gidlewski said.

“A freshman in engineering will end up paying 2,500 more dollars than their [older] brother or sister that entered at the same time,” she said. “That is a significant chunk of change.”

Gidlewski said she supports the proposal, as it could help decrease the College of Engineering’s student-to-faculty ratio and improve student recruitment.

“If the tuition surcharge goes through, that money will be used to hire more faculty and TAs, which should decrease the student-to-faculty ratio, that should help increase our rankings and help with recruitment,” she said.