The Board of Regents will vote on tuition increases for University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire and UW-La Crosse during their next meeting at UW Feb. 4 and 5. The proposals are the BluGold Commitment, which would phase-in a $1,200 increase in UW-Eau Claire tuition over the course of four years, and UW-LaCrosse’s Academic Excellence Initiative, which would increase tuition $60 each year for five years...

The University of Wisconsin System is trying to make it easier for campuses to suspend or eliminate unpopular academic programs. A UW System review identified programs that are graduating relatively few students and are offered elsewhere within the system. The review suggested some of the programs could be eliminated or merged to save money...

Student Senate voted 13-12 on Monday against recalling last semester's vote that approved a resolution in favor of the Blugold Commitment. In order to pass the recall, a two-thirds vote was needed, which would have required at least 17 senators to vote in favor of rescinding the resolution. The resolution supports increasing tuition $1,200 over four years, with 40 percent of that money going towards financial aid. The Blugold Commitment will now go before the Board of Regents tomorrow and Friday for final approval...Following Student Senate's decision not to rescind their vote passing the Blugold Commitment, freshman Aaron Rice began a movement to recall Umhoefer and student-body vice-president Amber Bretl because of their involvement...

Renovation of a residence hall at the University of Wisconsin-Stout is under way. Hovlid Hall on north campus will not house any students during the second semester, which began Monday, Jan. 25. About 150 students housed in Hovlid last fall moved to different residence halls this semester...Work on the building is part of a $13 million project that began in May 2009. Hovlid is being connected to a new dining and fitness facility, as well as a new lounge and front desk area that will link the buildings with adjacent Fleming hall. The complex is envisioned as the primary gathering place on north campus...

A memorial service was held on the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus Wednesday to remember a student who died after a bout with bacterial meningitis. Neha Suri, 22, died Tuesday at UW Hospital and Clinics with family and friends at her side. The university is remembering her as a writer for The Daily Cardinal newspaper who was active in the campus arts scene, worked at the SERF campus recreational facility and interned at the state Capitol. She was a journalism and political science major...

There is a future in poverty, and that unfortunate fact has become thought for food at the UW-Madison, where its poverty research program was chosen this week to host the nation’s research on meeting the needs of the hungry...

The sluggish economy took its toll on the amount donors were willing to give to colleges across the United States during the 2009 fiscal year, with donations down 11.9 percent from the previous year according to the Voluntary Support of Education Survey. How bad is that? Well, it's the steepest decline in the survey's 50-year history. But the news wasn't all awful, at least for the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which was the only Big Ten Conference institution to rank among the top 10 schools nationally in fundraising. Wisconsin's flagship institution brought in more than $340 million From July of 2008 through June of 2009 to rank 10th. That figure, however, was a drop of 16.7 percent from the previous year...

University of Wisconsin students who qualify for federal financial aid will borrow directly from the United States Department of Education instead of private banks and credit unions, UW announced Wednesday. Beginning this summer, UW will transition from the Federal Family Education Loan program to the William D. Ford Federal Direct Loan program. The current Federal Family Education Loan Program offers student loans that are guaranteed by the government, but provided by private lenders, said Susan Fischer, director of the Office of Student of Financial Aid. Under the new program, the U.S. government will act as the lender, giving direct loans to students and their parents, Fischer said...

College and university endowments suffered huge losses in the fiscal year that ended in June, a new report finds, but stronger investment returns in recent months point to a rebound...Locally, St. Norbert College and University of Wisconsin-Green Bay officials report a similar pattern — endowments that shrunk during the height of the financial crisis but are stronger now...Neither St. Norbert College nor UWGB traditionally has relied heavily on endowment spending, officials said. UWGB's endowments also were affected by the slumping economy, but officials are happy with the current $17 million and are hopeful for more growth, said Dan Spielmann, interim assistant chancellor for advancement...

Athletic events are not the only competitions going on around UW-Platteville this spring. RecycleMania, an international initiative designed to help save the earth, has made its way on campus for the 2010 season and in a few short weeks almost 5,000 pounds of recycled materials have been collected...

A small California-based company named College Financial Advisory has been sending letters to Wisconsin students claiming to help them find financial aid opportunities for a fee. Freshman Aaron Hrad received such a letter over winter break at his home in Phillips, Wis. He said the letter seemed very official until he looked closer at the fine print. "I noticed that it required a processing fee of $59," he said, "and I've never had to pay a fee for scholarships and stuff before so it was kind of the first red flag." He decided to do some research about CFA. Hrad discovered that it was in fact a real company but the address was not for a processing center like the letter claimed, but a postal drop box in San Diego, Calif...

With the 2010 elections looming and unemployment showing no signs of easing, there's one thing politicians of all stripes agree on: Voters want action on the jobs front..."These issues are not partisan issues," says state Rep. Pat Strachota, a third-term Republican from West Bend who's backing a sweeping package of tax credits, incentives and educational grants designed to spark the private sector...

Gov. Jim Doyle reiterated support for renewable energy and green, sustainable jobs as he spoke Wednesday at Gateway Technical College in Kenosha...

Amid the enrollment boom at community colleges, two-year honors programs have become more popular and -- in some cases -- more competitive than ever among traditional-age students...

At a time when the Obama administration is promising to increase spending on grants for college students by tens of billions of dollars, it might seem ungrateful, if not a bit tone deaf, for some college officials to be sweating the proposed elimination of a federal program worth just $64 million. But the administration's plan to end the Leveraging Educational Assistance Partnership program -- laid out in this week in its budget blueprint for the 2011 fiscal year -- does indeed trouble advocates for students...

The University of Minnesota ranked 16th nationally in the amount of private donations made to colleges and universities during the 2009 fiscal year, according to a report released Wednesday by the Council for Aid to Education...The University came in sixth among public university donations, just above the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and below the University of California, San Francisco. The University of Wisconsin was the only school in the Big Ten with more private donations...

Yale University announced on Wednesday that it planned a number of steps to close a remaining $150 million budget gap, including cutting staff, freezing salaries for deans and officers, reducing the number of graduate students — even turning down all thermostats to 68 degrees...

Stanford University garnered the largest total of private donations of any American college or university last year, for the fifth consecutive year, even while charitable support for higher education dropped about 12% nationwide because of the recession, according to a new survey...

A standoff between Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and California State University's Academic Senate has left the faculty without a representative on the system's Board of Trustees for seven months during a critical time for the nation's largest university system...