"Even with the next legislative session a year away, state Rep. Dan Branch, chair of the Higher Education Committee, has been visiting college presidents, delivering a frank warning: Texas families can’t take any more big tuition hikes, and neither can the cash-strapped state bail out bulging college budgets.Since 2003, when the Legislature deregulated tuition by allowing individual boards of regents to set prices for each school, tuition and fees at four-year state schools has skyrocketed by an average of 63 percent, from $1,934 per semester to $3,150 according to the last state figures, from 2008. At some schools, such as Stephen F. Austin, Prairie View A&M, and Texas A&M Galveston, the cost of an education nearly doubled in that five-year span."
