Students will pay an extra $5 per credit in tuition starting in the fall as part of a $151.3 million budget for fiscal year 2027.
Anne Arundel Community College’s Board of Trustees approved the budget Feb. 24. The spending plan is $8 million higher than last year’s.
At a budget workshop for the board on Feb. 19, Vice President for Learning Resources Management Melissa Beardmore called the decision to raise tuition and fees “painful.”
She said rising costs, combined with potentially less funding from Anne Arundel County and the state of Maryland, made the tuition hike necessary.
“The trends are pointing toward [future] tuition increases if we can’t get adequate funding from government sources,” she said.
Beardmore said AACC operates with three funding sources: the state, the county and tuition. When government funding falls short, she said, the college raises tuition and fees.
A $5-per credit tuition increase brings in-county to approximately $135 per credit. The increase will cost full-time, in-county students about $150 more per year, Beardmore said. That represents a 3% increase over last year’s tuition and fees.
Tuition for out-of-county students will be $317 per credit next school year, a $12 increase. Out-of-state students will pay $459 per credit, a $7-per-credit increase.
Beardmore said AACC’s tuition is tied for the fourth lowest among Maryland’s 16 community colleges.
“There’s some good feeling in that we rate out really well to our other schools,” Trustee Lawrence Ulvila Jr. said at the meeting. He added that the college needs to keep tuition low so students will not choose other schools with lower fees.
Beardmore said students have told her they would rather pay small tuition increases each year than face a double-digit increase all at once.
Some students said the tuition increase is high.
“I mean, $150 extra is a little bit asking a lot, especially for community college, where they go for like, cheaper tuition and everything,” Alex Fenton, a second-year marketing student, said.
First-year transfer studies student Alema Engel agreed.
“I do have financial aid that covers my stuff but … I think it’s not fair to people who are struggling to pay out of pocket for their classes,” Engel said.
